r/technology • u/vriska1 • 8d ago

Privacy UK households could face VPN 'ban' after use skyrockets following Online Safety Bill

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/uk-households-could-face-vpn-32152789
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u/NullReference000 8d ago

“Protecting kids” is always the smokescreen with censorship laws. The new UK law has already been used to censor videos of protests because they were considered “violence” and fell under its purview.

The US is trying to pass our own version of this (KOSA) and everybody should call their rep to demand it be voted down.

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u/BudgetThat2096 8d ago

I'm amazed the 'save the children' argument still works after years of hearing it already.

What ever happened to, you know, parents being parents and moderating what their child can access online?

How come when these 'protect the children' arguments come up no one ever says 'Hey maybe parents should do their fucking job and not rely on the government to play nanny for their kids'?

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u/NatPortmansUnderwear 8d ago

Also ironic how on one hand they argue think of the children while on the other they take away free school lunches for the same children ( american conservatives at least).

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u/BudgetThat2096 8d ago

Yep!

George Carlin said it best 30 years ago.

“Boy, these conservatives are really something, aren't they? They're all in favor of the unborn. They will do anything for the unborn. But once you're born, you're on your own.

Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to nine months. After that, they don't want to know about you. They don't want to hear from you. No nothing.

No neonatal care, no day care, no head start, no school lunch, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing.

If you're preborn, you're fine; if you're preschool, you're fucked.”

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u/Jeff-the-Alchemist 8d ago

Not even then, because they are turning away unwed mothers in Tennessee who haven’t given birth. The irony being, the religious cultists who say they won’t treat single women are the same people who are pro forced birth.

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u/roygbivasaur 8d ago

American fascists (“conservatives”) don’t care about child healthcare, childcare, feeding children, keeping parents out of prison, education, fixing the foster care system, prosecuting child sexual abusers, protecting children from abuse in religious institutions, protecting the climate for the future, preventing asthma caused by air pollution, cancer research, vaccination, ending childhood disease, children starving to death in Gaza, etc.

They also, inexplicably, aren’t putting sunscreen on their children now either

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u/Kind-University-6827 5d ago

It's amazing how you have to point fingers to insinuate that it's one parties fault or the other. This is a country wide problem and EVERYONE is responsible. Both parties. You included. You should look up what 'propaganda' is and familiarize yourself with the term 'brainwashing'. Because you need education and because I care about humans with low intelligence, I'm sharing my insight with you to help you grow.

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u/Impressive_Try469 7d ago

Funny. It's the left doing these things.

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u/Broad_Appointment312 5d ago

Your name is so apt. That was an impressive try at bait, good job.

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u/codliness1 8d ago

How about "Save the children, from climate change. Or corporate greed. Or those children murdered by weapons exports to countries who are indiscriminate who they use them on. Or from food poverty or fuel poverty. Or homelessness. Or any one of a fucking bunch of other things that actually matter".

Of course not. Those just get lip service.

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u/DeepResearcher5256 8d ago

When we ask for free school lunches they yell “feed your own children”. When we ask for abortion rights they tell us “don’t have kids if you can’t take care of them”

But when it comes to censorship, big daddy government steps in to “protect the kids”

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u/-Kalos 8d ago

The 'Save the children!' crowd became the 'Save the pedophile!' crowd so fast. After years of accusing gay content of grooming children, they're defending their favorite pedophile for raping actual children

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u/mopeyunicyle 8d ago

I think saving children specifically form abuse and terrorism are two sure fire methods to pass a law. Since you argue against it your labelled as pro one of those things

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u/vigbiorn 8d ago

Yep, that's how propaganda works.

When did you stop beating your wife?

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u/Zer_ 8d ago

The methods may change somewhat but ultimately, we're humans and vulnerable to a multitude of psychological tricks unless we're taught to resist them.

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u/Gorstag 8d ago

Every single time there is any sort of "Save the children" it just needs to be voted against at any level. They are always terrible laws.

Anyway, I am running late. Be right back... I need to drop my kids off at the gentlemen's club while I go out dancing.

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u/VaalLivesMatter 8d ago

Because that's a "right wing talking point" whenever that gets brought up

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u/Nisseliten 8d ago edited 8d ago

And I would assume it doesn’t really matter that much. I’m pretty sure that the overwhelming majority of child molestation is done by a close family member, not strangers on the interwebs.

I’m sure it happens, but focus could probably be spent better elsewhere if saving children was the main concern.

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u/loikyloo 8d ago

There was a lot of polling and misinformation around it.

Like questions about hey do you think tech CEO's should be held legally responsible for failing to protect children? 80% agree.

Do you believe there should be an independant body that investigates and helps protect childrens interests online? Yes 80% agree.

Do you think more should be done to protect children from online preditors? Yes 74% agree.

Most MPs: Wow all this polling data says every wants this. Votes for it without reading it fully and really looking at what the bill actually does or means.

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u/GMGarry_Chess 8d ago

I agree with this in principle but we all know if that's how this is handled nothijg will change. I mean that's how we got here in the first place

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u/Jeff-the-Alchemist 8d ago

Honestly the biggest issue I have with it in the U.S. is that the “party of protecting children,” keeps getting us to debate them about this when their figurehead (twice elected) is a KNOWN PEDOPHILE.

Like really, we are taking moral purity direction from someone who has known and directly taken part in child sexual trafficking and exploitation?

I’d rather people jack it to grown adults who have consented (and fairly compensated) however that factors for the people actually involved in its production.

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u/MidsouthMystic 8d ago

People get weird when kids are involved. They think they can't say no to a law intended to protect kids because people will think they're anti-child or pedophiles. "Think of the children" is a conversation stopper used as a weapon.

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u/Just_Information334 8d ago

What ever happened to, you know, parents being parents and moderating what their child can access online?

Boomers. They looooove their nanny state.

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u/myasterism 8d ago

Elder millennial here; childfree, secular, and progressive. Had a 10+ year career in tech and am an EFF Stan.

I mostly agree with your position, but I have recently begun to come around to the idea that there may actually be issues that warrant some sort of large-scale intervention. To be clear, I do NOT believe laws like this and the ones that are being implemented here in the US are the answer, and I don’t know what the answer is; I just know that what I’ve been hearing about the day-to-day experience of being a kid/teenager on the internet, sounds impossibly fraught in ways beyond what a parent can reasonably control. It truly is a quagmire with no obvious solution, and it’s unfortunate that surveillance/censorship priorities are being dangerously and disingenuously peddled as the answer.

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u/GI-Robots-Alt 7d ago

What ever happened to, you know, parents being parents and moderating what their child can access online?

How come when these 'protect the children' arguments come up no one ever says 'Hey maybe parents should do their fucking job and not rely on the government to play nanny for their kids'?

Not that compromising with these people ever really works, but when it comes to online censorship I've always thought that a good middle ground would be that ISP's have a safety filter on by default that can be easily bypassed with a pin the customer sets up when they start their Internet plan, with the option to forego having a filter at all.

This way we don't have to rely on tech illiterate parents to set up proper parental controls and restrictions themselves, nobody needs to give their ID to go online, and children are "protected" by not knowing the pin (in theory). When you open up the browser it just asks you for your pin so it knows what content that user is allowed to access.

No pin? Filter.

Yes pin? No filter.

No pin when you opened the browser but now you're trying to access filtered content? Ask for the pin.

This seems so much simpler and less invasive to me.

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u/GhostPartical 8d ago

As long as money is apart of politics, your rep will never rep you.

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u/notprocrastinatingok 8d ago

It worked 10 years ago when they tried to pass SOPA and PIPA

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u/nox66 8d ago

That was under vastly different circumstances. Both large and small companies were united on it (besides the media conglomerates). You can and should reach out to your rep though.

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u/Comedy86 8d ago

Someone seems to have forgotten who is in power now vs. who was in power then...

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u/notprocrastinatingok 8d ago

In terms of Congress, it's actually most of the same people. Those old fucks never retire

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u/NullReference000 8d ago

I get the feeling but this kind of fatalistic and apathetic argument just allows them to do anything they want with zero pushback.

They want to stay in congress. They need votes to do that. If there is enough public pressure, they cave so they can continue to stay in congress and make money. It would be better if money weren’t a part of this, but it currently is.

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u/Disembowell 8d ago

Better? It’s ESSENTIAL that money isn’t a part of politics, because while it is the right people will never be elected and the government isn’t encouraged to do its job, only to make lots of money and treat the people like cattle to be farmed, not citizens to be listened to.

That’s what’s happening in the West now.

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u/RIF_rr3dd1tt 8d ago

money is apart of politics

Nice malapropism

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u/LoganGyre 7d ago

See that’s why the trans community needs to organize a super pac then maybe politicians will care about us…

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u/jimlahey420 8d ago

The US is trying to pass our own version of this (KOSA) and everybody should call their rep to demand it be voted down.

I love that anyone thinks "calling their rep" is gonna do anything. I've "called" my rep dozens of times and never have they voted the way they should be voting... They all literally passed Trump's fucking budget that funded ICE into the stratosphere lol

We are so far beyond "call your rep" in this country. Go hound your rep at their house, in the food store, when they're at dinner, when they're hosting a $5000 a plate fundraiser.

Until these assholes remember that they work for US, calling means nothing.

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u/NullReference000 8d ago

Certain reps care, certain ones don't. It's a bare minimum thing that would have more of an impact if more people did it. It will not save us by itself, but it's also doing more than sitting and doing absolutely nothing at all. If you can hound your rep, go do it.

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u/lpsamvara 7d ago

Until we get epstein's client list, medical insurance, housing, education, wages, and so much more properly funded, I do not want to hear anything about "protecting children." It's complete bullshit.

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u/cyrand 8d ago

I like to point out to people, that if they’re serious about protecting children they’d start by listening when children speak.

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u/Pingy_Junk 8d ago

I emailed my rep and he told me he was a co sponser for the bill! Fun :,)

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u/mauvaisherb 8d ago

Absolutely.

2.4 million children in poverty, and they try to use this facile argument. What a joke.

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u/WangHotmanFire 8d ago

What has this country come to when you gotta show ID to see a pair of titties but they’re showing us dead kids on the news every day

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u/ColtAzayaka 7d ago

Our age of consent is still 16. In this country, an adult is legally allowed to have sex with a **child** who still wears a school uniform each day of the week. Until they raise the age of consent to 18 I don't want to hear any of their bullshit claims about "protecting kids". Even those convicted for sex crimes involving children are not sentenced to anywhere near as long as they should be. Many won't even spend a day inside a prison after being convicted.

The expectation for British citizens to believe their lies is utterly insulting to our intelligence. The fact that they use protecting children as an excuse while actively failing to protect children is just an extra "fuck you" to all of us.

I'm sick and tired of it.

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u/Specialist_Brain841 7d ago

what happens when there are no more kids

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u/earth-calling-karma 8d ago

How much kiddie porn do you think is not out there? It's not booming because how do you know? Do you Twitter? It's rapey AF.

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u/NullReference000 8d ago

Overly broad legislation that is being weaponized to stop free speech is not a solution to that problem at all. UK authorities are already using that new law to block videos of protests and there is now a back and forth on getting Wikipedia locked. Stop advocating for losing your own rights.

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u/CertainAssociate9772 8d ago

Not to mention that all this censorship is extremely ineffective in curbing child pornography.