Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

[internetworkers AT lists.ibiblio.org (Steven Champeon)]

on Mon, Feb 03, 2003 at 05:19:23PM -0500, Gina Norman wrote:
> 2) Major ponderables:
> I'd like to generate a set of questions that can get the discussion started
> (or scoot it along, should it stall).  My personal POV is almost always
> against censorship; however, as a facilitator I'd really like to be able to
> play devil's advocate on this, so if you can help me think through the
> issues from "the other side" that would be helpful.

As list mom for the webdesign-L list, I see a lot higher usage of
blocking/filtering software in larger orgs lately (say, over the past
two years) - bear in mind that I'm talking about email, not Web or other
protocols/technologies. Most of what I have seen in the form of bounce
messages deals with virus protection, its correlate, blocking messages
related to hoaxes (such as recently, when a message sent to the list
bounced from a number of sites due to it being related to the jdbmgr.exe
hoax), "sensitive content" such as profanity, sexist remarks, and other
such stuff, and the like. I've found that most of the software is very
overeager - blocking plain text email based on some pattern that is also
found in viruses/worms, for example. Half of the traffic sent to this
list in the past two days would have bounced from Rational, for example,
as offensive or as violations of their incredibly sensitive policies
on sexism or what not. 

We filter inbound mail against a wide variety of virus patterns, too. 

Beyond that, though, you're on your own. 

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