McIntyre, T.J. --- "Child abuse images and cleanfeeds: assessing internet blocking systems" [2013] ELECD 528; in Brown, Ian (ed), "Research Handbook on Governance of the Internet" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2013) 277

Book Title: Research Handbook on Governance of the Internet

Editor(s): Brown, Ian

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849805025

Section: Chapter 12

Section Title: Child abuse images and cleanfeeds: assessing internet blocking systems

Author(s): McIntyre, T.J.

Number of pages: 32

Abstract/Description:

One of the most important trends in internet governance in recent years has been the growth of internet blocking as a policy tool, to the point where it is increasingly becoming a global norm. This is most obvious in states such as China where blocking is used to suppress political speech; however, in the last decade blocking has also become more common in democracies, usually as part of attempts to limit the availability of child abuse images. Numerous governments have therefore settled on blocking as their “primary solution” towards preventing such images from being distributed (Villeneuve 2010). Child abuse image blocking has, however, been extremely controversial within the academic, civil liberties and technical communities, and this debate has recently taken on a wider public dimension. At the time of writing, for example, public pressure has forced the German Federal Government to abandon legislation which would have introduced a police run system while the European Parliament has also rejected Commission proposals for mandatory blocking (Baker 2011; Zuvela 2011).