5 ms·

3 days before elections, largest German state censors Pirate Party from the net

72 points by im_dario 14y ago

sp332 14y ago
What "list from IBM" would they be using? Can anyone confirm this categorization of the site as "illegal drugs"? Edit: any chance this was done by someone in support of the pirate party?
- wmf 14y ago
  As a general policy, censorware companies don't want people to be able to see the lists of blocked URLs because they're so embarrassingly over-reaching.
pilom 14y ago
Sounds like it was just censored in schools with a NetNanny type internet filter. What's the voting age in Germany again?
- im_dario 14y ago
  Based on this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_age#G http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_age#G and its references, the voting age in Germany for state elections is 16 years old.
  - mahrz 14y ago
    But only for municipal elections in some federal states. For state elections it is 18 in all federal states except for Bremen where the voting age is also 16. However, there are students at school that are already 18, so I can see the problem here. Though it seems that it was caused by a misconfigured filter and clearly lack of intent.
  - mxfh 14y ago
    Its 18. In North-Rhine Westphalia. http://www.wahlrecht.de/landtage/ http://www.wahlrecht.de/landtage/ End yes, just this was most likely just one commercial filter going rogue on drug related words in one school only, which blocked a completely legal and g-rated drug politics statement on the website of the pirate party. http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fnetzpolitik.org%2F2012%2Fnetz-sperren-in-schulen-nrw-zensiert-piratenpartei%2F http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&...
FredericJ 14y ago
Where is the democracy ?
oskarth 14y ago
This ought to be counter-productive, considering that most students either know or potentially know about the Pirate Party. All this does is making people who didn't care enough become interested. I think the Pirate Party will probably get more votes from this, as people like to feel they are sticking up to the man - voting on a censored and a non-non-sensical party seems like a good way of doing it, especially since their views are aligned with most students views.
lispm 14y ago
this headline is misleading. The website was blocked in some schools due to an incompetent configuration of a filter software. The filter configuration has been changed.
- jlgreco 14y ago
  Don't forget the corollary to Hanlon's Razor, Grey's Law: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice."
nextstep 14y ago
This isn't censorship any more than blocking porn in high school libraries is considered censorship. This wasn't a move by rival political parties. The school in question used some third party web filter which flagged the pirate party's website as drug-related.
Joakal 14y ago
There is a possibility of censorship of the Dutch party since yesterday. Dutch court bans Pirate Party links to The Pirate Bay http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18016819 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18016819

72 points by im_dario 14y ago

sp332 14y ago

What "list from IBM" would they be using? Can anyone confirm this categorization of the site as "illegal drugs"? Edit: any chance this was done by someone in support of the pirate party?

wmf 14y ago
As a general policy, censorware companies don't want people to be able to see the lists of blocked URLs because they're so embarrassingly over-reaching.

pilom 14y ago

Sounds like it was just censored in schools with a NetNanny type internet filter. What's the voting age in Germany again?

im_dario 14y ago
Based on this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_age#G http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_age#G and its references, the voting age in Germany for state elections is 16 years old.
- mahrz 14y ago
  But only for municipal elections in some federal states. For state elections it is 18 in all federal states except for Bremen where the voting age is also 16. However, there are students at school that are already 18, so I can see the problem here. Though it seems that it was caused by a misconfigured filter and clearly lack of intent.
- mxfh 14y ago
  Its 18. In North-Rhine Westphalia. http://www.wahlrecht.de/landtage/ http://www.wahlrecht.de/landtage/ End yes, just this was most likely just one commercial filter going rogue on drug related words in one school only, which blocked a completely legal and g-rated drug politics statement on the website of the pirate party. http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fnetzpolitik.org%2F2012%2Fnetz-sperren-in-schulen-nrw-zensiert-piratenpartei%2F http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&...

FredericJ 14y ago

Where is the democracy ?

oskarth 14y ago

This ought to be counter-productive, considering that most students either know or potentially know about the Pirate Party. All this does is making people who didn't care enough become interested. I think the Pirate Party will probably get more votes from this, as people like to feel they are sticking up to the man - voting on a censored and a non-non-sensical party seems like a good way of doing it, especially since their views are aligned with most students views.

lispm 14y ago

this headline is misleading. The website was blocked in some schools due to an incompetent configuration of a filter software. The filter configuration has been changed.

jlgreco 14y ago
Don't forget the corollary to Hanlon's Razor, Grey's Law: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice."

nextstep 14y ago

This isn't censorship any more than blocking porn in high school libraries is considered censorship. This wasn't a move by rival political parties. The school in question used some third party web filter which flagged the pirate party's website as drug-related.

Joakal 14y ago

There is a possibility of censorship of the Dutch party since yesterday. Dutch court bans Pirate Party links to The Pirate Bay http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18016819 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18016819