5 ms·

Well, that's certainly part of the issue. But even if Freenet users were immune from prosecution for what's in the data store on their hard drives, does that m

Well, that's certainly part of the issue. But even if Freenet users were immune from prosecution for what's in the data store on their hard drives, does that make the possibility of aiding the distribution of child pornography any less repugnant? What about other material that goes far beyond simply being offensive?

icebraining 12y ago
Every ISP is also aiding this distribution. Does that make running an ISP a repugnant activity? I don't think so.
upofadown 12y ago
It would not bother me at all. The stuff in the Freenet distributed store is all hard encrypted in a way I have no access to. I literally believe that the content ceases to exist while it is encrypted. To think any other way would allow me to believe that the file was also haunted by evil spirits and the like. As I am a rationalist I would prefer to avoid that sort of thought.
- x1798DE 12y ago
  That doesn't make any sense at all. The fact that you can't access it doesn't mean you're not aiding in the distribution of it. If someone puts a ham sandwich in a locked box to which you do not have the key, and you bring the box to someone else who has the key, does that mean you didn't deliver the ham sandwich? I'm not saying I agree with the parent comment, but your reasoning is bizarre.
  - upofadown 12y ago
    There are no physical objects involved here. It is entirely data. The only thing that can possibly happen is that you could gain knowledge of the data. Someone could claim that there was some child porn embedded in the centre of a mountain but it would be just a claim. There would fundamentally be no way to prove that it was any particular thing unless someone admits to putting it there. The people that invented the cryptography very much intended to create this philosophical situation. We can't pretend otherwise without breaking the cryptography.
    - x1798DE 12y ago
      That's really not the point. Whether or not you know what you are doing, you are the mechanism by which child porn is distributed. From a Bayesian perspective, you can just decide how "at fault" you are. If you're in a firing squad of 10 people and 1 guy has blanks, there's a 90% chance you're firing real bullets at the guy in front of you, even though you may have no real way of knowing whether you're actually firing blanks or bullets. Either way, there's the objective fact of what you are doing (which is independent of your knowledge of the fact) and the degree of your complicity in the action. The parent is saying that they are uncomfortable with knowing that there is an x% chance they are aiding in the distribution of child pornography. There's an argument to be made that providing infrastructure is very different from active engagement, but it's bizarre to pretend that because you can't objectively know what each packet contains that you are therefore absolved of all knowledge of the situation.
  - shawn-butler 12y ago
    No. You are not distributing the ham sandwich. You are distributing a locked box. You would only be aiding in the distribution of a ham sandwich if you had some reasonable suspicion the box contained a ham sandwich. In the western legal canons, mens rea / intent either conditional or unconditional must be present for a criminal act. I would not say I dedicate storage to freenet knowing that some of the content on my property is child porn in order for free speech to flourish. That could be construed as conditional intent. I would say I dedicate storage to freenet in order to (insert reason here). I have no idea what is being stored in the box nor could I know.
adrianN 12y ago
From the Freenet FAQ[1]: The true test of someone who claims to believe in Freedom of Speech is whether they tolerate speech which they disagree with, or even find disgusting. If we are in favor of truly anonymous and free communication, we must not try to censor the content at all. The question is whether we really do support freedom of speech. In many (all?) European countries for example, freedom of speech is restricted. The freedom stops where it does harm to other people. It is a difficult problem to judge on a case by case basis when the freedom to communicate is more important than the feelings of other people. [1] https://freenetproject.org/faq.html#offensive https://freenetproject.org/faq.html#offensive
mrsteveman1 12y ago
Aren't operators of Tor relays also "aiding distribution" by that standard? They may not be storing anything (yet [1]), but they're still passing along unknown traffic. In fact they're even LESS aware of what their relays are being used for than a Freenet node operator, who can, if they choose to, both discover some of what is in their data store, and purge specific data from it given a known key (though it would be an endless battle and perhaps expose them to even more legal risk). [1] It's not hard to imagine a future Tor version implementing a successor to hidden services that involves caching or securely storing data in some manner that completely prevents the relay operator from knowing what is there.

icebraining 12y ago

Every ISP is also aiding this distribution. Does that make running an ISP a repugnant activity? I don't think so.

upofadown 12y ago

It would not bother me at all. The stuff in the Freenet distributed store is all hard encrypted in a way I have no access to. I literally believe that the content ceases to exist while it is encrypted. To think any other way would allow me to believe that the file was also haunted by evil spirits and the like. As I am a rationalist I would prefer to avoid that sort of thought.

x1798DE 12y ago
That doesn't make any sense at all. The fact that you can't access it doesn't mean you're not aiding in the distribution of it. If someone puts a ham sandwich in a locked box to which you do not have the key, and you bring the box to someone else who has the key, does that mean you didn't deliver the ham sandwich? I'm not saying I agree with the parent comment, but your reasoning is bizarre.
- upofadown 12y ago
  There are no physical objects involved here. It is entirely data. The only thing that can possibly happen is that you could gain knowledge of the data. Someone could claim that there was some child porn embedded in the centre of a mountain but it would be just a claim. There would fundamentally be no way to prove that it was any particular thing unless someone admits to putting it there. The people that invented the cryptography very much intended to create this philosophical situation. We can't pretend otherwise without breaking the cryptography.
  - x1798DE 12y ago
    That's really not the point. Whether or not you know what you are doing, you are the mechanism by which child porn is distributed. From a Bayesian perspective, you can just decide how "at fault" you are. If you're in a firing squad of 10 people and 1 guy has blanks, there's a 90% chance you're firing real bullets at the guy in front of you, even though you may have no real way of knowing whether you're actually firing blanks or bullets. Either way, there's the objective fact of what you are doing (which is independent of your knowledge of the fact) and the degree of your complicity in the action. The parent is saying that they are uncomfortable with knowing that there is an x% chance they are aiding in the distribution of child pornography. There's an argument to be made that providing infrastructure is very different from active engagement, but it's bizarre to pretend that because you can't objectively know what each packet contains that you are therefore absolved of all knowledge of the situation.
- shawn-butler 12y ago
  No. You are not distributing the ham sandwich. You are distributing a locked box. You would only be aiding in the distribution of a ham sandwich if you had some reasonable suspicion the box contained a ham sandwich. In the western legal canons, mens rea / intent either conditional or unconditional must be present for a criminal act. I would not say I dedicate storage to freenet knowing that some of the content on my property is child porn in order for free speech to flourish. That could be construed as conditional intent. I would say I dedicate storage to freenet in order to (insert reason here). I have no idea what is being stored in the box nor could I know.

adrianN 12y ago

From the Freenet FAQ[1]: The true test of someone who claims to believe in Freedom of Speech is whether they tolerate speech which they disagree with, or even find disgusting. If we are in favor of truly anonymous and free communication, we must not try to censor the content at all. The question is whether we really do support freedom of speech. In many (all?) European countries for example, freedom of speech is restricted. The freedom stops where it does harm to other people. It is a difficult problem to judge on a case by case basis when the freedom to communicate is more important than the feelings of other people. [1] https://freenetproject.org/faq.html#offensive https://freenetproject.org/faq.html#offensive

mrsteveman1 12y ago

Aren't operators of Tor relays also "aiding distribution" by that standard? They may not be storing anything (yet [1]), but they're still passing along unknown traffic. In fact they're even LESS aware of what their relays are being used for than a Freenet node operator, who can, if they choose to, both discover some of what is in their data store, and purge specific data from it given a known key (though it would be an endless battle and perhaps expose them to even more legal risk). [1] It's not hard to imagine a future Tor version implementing a successor to hidden services that involves caching or securely storing data in some manner that completely prevents the relay operator from knowing what is there.