6 ms·

Many years ago (ca. 2009?) at a previous employer we had an enterprise email scanner which included a content filtering feature which could block "pornographic

Many years ago (ca. 2009?) at a previous employer we had an enterprise email scanner which included a content filtering feature which could block "pornographic images". We ended up turning it off as it had too many false positives since it was an insurance company that dealt with injuries so a lot of legitimate injury photos would get classed as porn and blocked. I think it was basically looking at how much of an image was skin tones. The more interesting thing about that feature was that it A) only blocked nude images of white people, and B) would aggressively block photos of golden retrievers much to the annoyance of someone in the claims team who bred them and occasionally received photos to her work email.

bogota 4y ago
> aggressively block photos of golden retrievers That gave me a good laugh
ramesh31 4y ago
There was an XKCD comic around that timeframe: https://xkcd.com/1425/ https://xkcd.com/1425/ And it really sticks out as one of the few paradigm shifts we’ve had in the last 10 years. In 2009, it really was an impossible task to do that kind of image recognition. But by 2012, it was available in a library for anyone.
- w-ll 4y ago
  Even outside of image recognition, this is my most common referenced XKCD comic, with non tech managers trying to guess timelines of work.
  - mikepurvis 4y ago
    That honour goes to 927 in my circles, and it's not even close.
- nl 4y ago
  Small correction - it wasn't until 2014 that it was widely available in libraries. AlexNet was September 2012. FlickR did their XKCD1425 bird detector in Oct 2014: https://code.flickr.net/2014/10/20/introducing-flickr-park-or-bird/ https://code.flickr.net/2014/10/20/introducing-flickr-park-o...
  - VoidWhisperer 4y ago
    Unfortunately their parkorbird site no longer exists and leads to a yahoo error page
- HWR_14 4y ago
  Wasn't it about 5 years between when the XKCD comic was published and it became a library. Powered by the work of numerous research teams.
MerelyMortal 4y ago
"A)" reminds me of a certain Better Off Ted episode. (If anyone here hasn't watched the series, do yourself a favor and do so.)
- papito 4y ago
  Better Off Ted had a great premise, but it didn't survive past two seasons because it didn't "click". It was the right idea, but just like with successful shows, certain magic that not even the creators understand has to happen. And it didn't happen here, which is a shame. That said, still a very entertaining show.
  - dwighttk 4y ago
    Shoulda spun off Phil and Lem
russdill 4y ago
In this case, they blur the image and allow the user to click to unblur.
dorkwood 4y ago
I once tried to post an image to Discord over and over, only to keep receiving one of those "there's been a problem" messages. It turned out the untextured 3D pig's head in my image was tripping Discord's porno filter. I can only assume it was the shape of its snout.
HeavenFox 4y ago
In China: * During COVID, a medical school professor complains his class livestream would get cut off constantly without warning because he is teaching anatomy and showing pictures. * Civics class online quiz. Multiple choice question. A: *; B: *; C: *; D: * - apparently all four choices are censored because they are names of Chinese leader. * A police officer complains his files related to a rape case he is investigating was deleted by the cloud service provider
suzzer99 4y ago
Google docs spell/grammar check shuts off if the word "anal" appears anywhere in a sentence. https://imgur.com/dTJmsTt https://imgur.com/dTJmsTt For some reason "anal" and the F-bomb are the only two words I can find where it does this. The craziest part is if you type something like "analss gland" it figures out you're trying to type "anal gland" and shuts down spellcheck, even though anal gland (dogs) is a perfectly g-rated use of the word anal. https://imgur.com/KjWcQJm https://imgur.com/KjWcQJm
- Freak_NL 4y ago
  Even the word fuck can be perfectly acceptable in plenty of contexts. Weird that someone went to the trouble of building in weird kill-switch exceptions in a spell checker. “This feature remains severely disliked by users, with feedback such as ‘Fuck this moronic new button!’ being an example of the milder responses.”
  - techdragon 4y ago
    As an Australian, I’m fucking livid these fucks think they have the right to fuck around with my use of the word fuck. That is to say… as a native speaker of the lovely little English variant where the word fuck or words derived from it are valid in almost every single linguistic context the English language possesses… I take offence at this petty US cultural imperialism. Just looking at the sheer flexibility of the word on the wiktionary reveals it’s impressive breadth of use. https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/fuck#English https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/fuck#English
    - LtWorf 4y ago
      ah yes, basically the reason why i created by own code of conduct for github projects. https://github.com/ltworf/international_code_of_conduct/blob/master/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md https://github.com/ltworf/international_code_of_conduct/blob...
- causi 4y ago
  Sometimes I think there's a specific person at Google with some kind of vocabulary-related mental illness. Just try and get Google Voice Typing to type the word "o'clock". You can stand there saying it over and over, and Google won't stop listening indicating it's hearing and interpreting the word, but it just refuses to type it.
stevesimmons 4y ago
I used to work at a place that blocked a significant fraction of incoming Dutch emails. Eventually we figured out it rejected any message with "kunt" ("he/she can"), which is not exactly uncommon. Apparently they were flagged as deliberate attempts to circumvent the profanity filter.
- wink 4y ago
  good ol' email filters with the *.stud.university.edu emails (stud as in student)...
- benj111 4y ago
  Do you want to block attempts to skirt the profanity filter? How to you avoid reintroducing the Scunthorpe problem? Jeez, darn are all mild forms of expletives, should they be blocked? What about bloody? That many anglophones would go to if you couldn't swear? Surely if you can't use those, people are just going to say gosh instead, or Smeg or frel. Should they also be banned. Swear words exist for a reason, you can perhaps get rid of the harshest forms, you are never going to remove the need or desire for people to swear though.

bogota 4y ago

> aggressively block photos of golden retrievers That gave me a good laugh

ramesh31 4y ago

There was an XKCD comic around that timeframe: https://xkcd.com/1425/ https://xkcd.com/1425/ And it really sticks out as one of the few paradigm shifts we’ve had in the last 10 years. In 2009, it really was an impossible task to do that kind of image recognition. But by 2012, it was available in a library for anyone.

w-ll 4y ago
Even outside of image recognition, this is my most common referenced XKCD comic, with non tech managers trying to guess timelines of work.
- mikepurvis 4y ago
  That honour goes to 927 in my circles, and it's not even close.
nl 4y ago
Small correction - it wasn't until 2014 that it was widely available in libraries. AlexNet was September 2012. FlickR did their XKCD1425 bird detector in Oct 2014: https://code.flickr.net/2014/10/20/introducing-flickr-park-or-bird/ https://code.flickr.net/2014/10/20/introducing-flickr-park-o...
- VoidWhisperer 4y ago
  Unfortunately their parkorbird site no longer exists and leads to a yahoo error page
HWR_14 4y ago
Wasn't it about 5 years between when the XKCD comic was published and it became a library. Powered by the work of numerous research teams.

MerelyMortal 4y ago

"A)" reminds me of a certain Better Off Ted episode. (If anyone here hasn't watched the series, do yourself a favor and do so.)

papito 4y ago
Better Off Ted had a great premise, but it didn't survive past two seasons because it didn't "click". It was the right idea, but just like with successful shows, certain magic that not even the creators understand has to happen. And it didn't happen here, which is a shame. That said, still a very entertaining show.
- dwighttk 4y ago
  Shoulda spun off Phil and Lem

russdill 4y ago

In this case, they blur the image and allow the user to click to unblur.

dorkwood 4y ago

I once tried to post an image to Discord over and over, only to keep receiving one of those "there's been a problem" messages. It turned out the untextured 3D pig's head in my image was tripping Discord's porno filter. I can only assume it was the shape of its snout.

HeavenFox 4y ago

In China: * During COVID, a medical school professor complains his class livestream would get cut off constantly without warning because he is teaching anatomy and showing pictures. * Civics class online quiz. Multiple choice question. A: *; B: *; C: *; D: * - apparently all four choices are censored because they are names of Chinese leader. * A police officer complains his files related to a rape case he is investigating was deleted by the cloud service provider

suzzer99 4y ago

Google docs spell/grammar check shuts off if the word "anal" appears anywhere in a sentence. https://imgur.com/dTJmsTt https://imgur.com/dTJmsTt For some reason "anal" and the F-bomb are the only two words I can find where it does this. The craziest part is if you type something like "analss gland" it figures out you're trying to type "anal gland" and shuts down spellcheck, even though anal gland (dogs) is a perfectly g-rated use of the word anal. https://imgur.com/KjWcQJm https://imgur.com/KjWcQJm

Freak_NL 4y ago
Even the word fuck can be perfectly acceptable in plenty of contexts. Weird that someone went to the trouble of building in weird kill-switch exceptions in a spell checker. “This feature remains severely disliked by users, with feedback such as ‘Fuck this moronic new button!’ being an example of the milder responses.”
- techdragon 4y ago
  As an Australian, I’m fucking livid these fucks think they have the right to fuck around with my use of the word fuck. That is to say… as a native speaker of the lovely little English variant where the word fuck or words derived from it are valid in almost every single linguistic context the English language possesses… I take offence at this petty US cultural imperialism. Just looking at the sheer flexibility of the word on the wiktionary reveals it’s impressive breadth of use. https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/fuck#English https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/fuck#English
  - LtWorf 4y ago
    ah yes, basically the reason why i created by own code of conduct for github projects. https://github.com/ltworf/international_code_of_conduct/blob/master/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md https://github.com/ltworf/international_code_of_conduct/blob...
causi 4y ago
Sometimes I think there's a specific person at Google with some kind of vocabulary-related mental illness. Just try and get Google Voice Typing to type the word "o'clock". You can stand there saying it over and over, and Google won't stop listening indicating it's hearing and interpreting the word, but it just refuses to type it.

stevesimmons 4y ago

I used to work at a place that blocked a significant fraction of incoming Dutch emails. Eventually we figured out it rejected any message with "kunt" ("he/she can"), which is not exactly uncommon. Apparently they were flagged as deliberate attempts to circumvent the profanity filter.

wink 4y ago
good ol' email filters with the *.stud.university.edu emails (stud as in student)...
benj111 4y ago
Do you want to block attempts to skirt the profanity filter? How to you avoid reintroducing the Scunthorpe problem? Jeez, darn are all mild forms of expletives, should they be blocked? What about bloody? That many anglophones would go to if you couldn't swear? Surely if you can't use those, people are just going to say gosh instead, or Smeg or frel. Should they also be banned. Swear words exist for a reason, you can perhaps get rid of the harshest forms, you are never going to remove the need or desire for people to swear though.