Will Basschat survive the Online Safety Act?

[fretmeister]

8 hours ago, Beedster said:

The politicians aren’t the idiots, they know exactly what they’re doing and how (in)effective it will be. We’re the idiots for allowing them to.

Mmm…

 

I remember when Nadine Dorries asked Microsoft when they would stop using algorithms….

[asingardenof]

15 hours ago, Beedster said:

It all feels extremely dystopian, can someone explain in simple terms the rationale for the legislation? 

Protecting children seems to be the main driver

[asingardenof]

13 hours ago, Beedster said:

So it’s placebo legislation and they know it is?

The politician's syllogism:

 

1. We must do something

2. This is something

3. Therefore we must do this

[Beedster]

3 hours ago, fretmeister said:

Mmm…

 

I remember when Nadine Dorries asked Microsoft when they would stop using algorithms….

I wasn’t saying they’re intelligent, quite the opposite really given it seems they’ve knowingly chosen a crude catch-all method when something more subtle was required 

[TimR]

4 minutes ago, asingardenof said:

Protecting children seems to be the main driver

 

All vulnerable people. Which is going to include old people and any of us who are open to be scammed etc. 

 

Effectively if you own a property and you knowingly allow undesirables to hang around and cause harm, you could be held responsible for failing to deal with it. Online should be no different other than the number of people could be exponentially higher. 

[asingardenof]

My MP happens to be the current Home Secretary. I've written her an email but I fully expect it to be either ignored or generate a boilerplate response from some constituency staffer.

[zbd1960]

17 hours ago, prowla said:

These attempts to control people are really annoying; all they do is make things difficult for ordinary folks whilst the actual criminals just move on to something else.

Like all the meaningless anti-money laundering legislation. All that does is make things likesorting out a relative's estate, or  buying a house or a car, an expensive pain in the butt and does absolutely nothing about real money laundering e.g. large parts of London's property market. It's being seen to 'do' something whilst not doing anything at all of any meaningful use. 

[rwillett]

34 minutes ago, asingardenof said:

My MP happens to be the current Home Secretary. I've written her an email but I fully expect it to be either ignored or generate a boilerplate response from some constituency staffer.

 

As she is your MP, she should reply in her capacity as your MP to one of her constituents, rather than as Home Sec. I would be somewhat surprised if her response is anything but 100% supportive of the Home Secretary.

 

There is zero chance of the act being repealed, but there is a small chance that guidance will be more forthcoming and may be more explicit in defining things like small websites. The main targets of the legislation are:

 

1. The newspapers so the govt can be seen to do something, anything.
 

2. The various local party faithful who need to be assuaged that the govt is doing something, anything and are "thinking of the children".
 

3. A big stick to go after the large social media companies who to be honest do sod all when they could do an awful lot more. Twitter comes to mind here, Facebook is almost as bad, YouTube probably behind them. The govt has given itself a very big stick to beat these companies with. The companies will bleat and shout and whinge but they want the revenue that all of their social media brings to them, so they'll roll over and complain loudly about their first amendment rights and they'll be reminded that they have zero first amendment rights in this country, so no, you can't put out articles or crap falsely saying that a trans-left wing-immigrant-soros-supporter stabbed 97 people to death in a church in Stafford and then claim it was just opinion or somebody else reported it or "I was just asking the question" when other people turn up and start rioting. Words as well as actions now have consequences.
 

4. It also does give some stick to beat smaller websites up, but if Basschat promptly removes things that breach the T&C's, and so long as it's not clearly illegal, such as child pornography, I'd be more than astonished that it goes any further. Websites cannot be held liable (as far as I can work out from the briefing papers) if somebody posts something illegal and that is immediately flagged and removed. This would mean I could logon to Facebook using a fake account, post a whole load of stuff, log off (from my VPN1 and VPN2 and VPN3 all in very different countries), and Facebook has all the consequences. Whilst part of me thinks this is a great idea, I can't think it's true. If Facebook leaves it up after its been reported or flagged using some sort of content automation. then the law kicks in.

 

5. Most of the stuff they are really interested in is on the dark web. Sadly you can get just about anything there. and I mean anything. There is little chance of that being policed due to the way its designed and built.  It was built to bypass censorship and this is the consequence. The govt in party can rant all they like about it, but there's zero chance of blocking that fromworking.

 

There is the danger that this could be another dangerous dogs act or more likely it'll be focussed on the bigger social media companies, I suspect the latter but simply don;t know.

 

Rob

Edited December 20, 2024 by rwillett

[Obrienp]

I can see this creating a new market for risk assessments. People will set themselves up as experts offering a risk assessment service for sites and forums. Who knows, Ofcom might set up qualifications like there are for financial advisors. What’s certain is that it’s going to cost people more than it does now.

[rwillett]

Just now, Obrienp said:

I can see this creating a new market for risk assessments. People will set themselves up as experts offering a risk assessment service for sites and forums. Who knows, Ofcom might set up qualifications like there are for financial advisors. What’s certain is that it’s going to cost people more than it does now.

I was thinking about doing that myself

 

There will be people doing this for a living and there will be online forms to go through and tick the boxes.

Rob

[TimR]

19 minutes ago, rwillett said:

There is little chance of that being policed due to the way its designed and built.

 

You don't police it. You make it illegal to access it. And if VPN companies are creating software that allows its use, then they're also culpable. 

[Woodinblack]

13 hours ago, Grooverjr said:

Very interesting. Not clearly defined but I assume BC would be small, low risk and it looks like most of those required elements are already in place so maybe there is hope

 

Actually seems not too onerous, one contact person to talk to, and a system to take down illegal things quickly, which we pretty well have.

[Bassassin]

2 hours ago, TimR said:

 

You don't police it. You make it illegal to access it. And if VPN companies are creating software that allows its use, then they're also culpable. 

 I've spent the last 10+ years frankly amazed that some hysterical MP hasn't proposed outlawing VPNs. I guess they still haven't heard of them.

[rwillett]

26 minutes ago, Bassassin said:

 I've spent the last 10+ years frankly amazed that some hysterical MP hasn't proposed outlawing VPNs. I guess they still haven't heard of them.

Since the govt uses VPNs all the time, unlikely to happen. 

 

 

[Beedster]

Just now, rwillett said:

Since the govt uses VPNs all the time, unlikely to happen. 

 

 

Which doesn't mean they know what they are or even that they're using them  

[Obrienp]

9 minutes ago, rwillett said:

Since the govt uses VPNs all the time, unlikely to happen. 

 

 

So do pretty well all companies and large organisations of any kind (charities, etc). I guess they could try to ban them for private individual use but they are a useful tool to provide added security when using the internet for things like banking. There would be quite an outcry if they did try to ban their use.

[Rich]

On 19/12/2024 at 12:17, Happy Jack said:

I'm pretty sure that they're trying to sneak through the legislation while we're all binge-watching

 

Hidden Secret Mysteries of the Lost Nazi Gold on the Titanic. With Dinosaurs. And Vikings.

 

On 19/12/2024 at 12:23, paul_5 said:

...IN SPACE!!

 

In a hole! With an OWL!

 

[TimR]

2 hours ago, Bassassin said:

 I've spent the last 10+ years frankly amazed that some hysterical MP hasn't proposed outlawing VPNs. I guess they still haven't heard of them.

 

Ha. Yes.

 

I'm not talking about banning VPNs. I'm talking about fixing a white list to VPN software. 

 

Although I'm not sure of the exact mechanics behind VPNs. 

 

Edit: you're essentially using the VPN services server as an ISP. So yes, it would be pretty simple to do. 

Edited December 20, 2024 by TimR

[zbd1960]

3 hours ago, Rich said:

 

 

In a hole! With an OWL!

 

You missed whilst digging more holes in Joke Oak Island...

[Bassassin]

3 hours ago, TimR said:

 

Ha. Yes.

 

I'm not talking about banning VPNs. I'm talking about fixing a white list to VPN software. 

 

Although I'm not sure of the exact mechanics behind VPNs. 

 

Edit: you're essentially using the VPN services server as an ISP. So yes, it would be pretty simple to do. 

 

All the time VPN providers make a big selling point of keeping no records of user traffic & never, ever making any records they do hold available to external scrutiny (which may or may not be true!) then that seems improbable. If the service VPN providers offered was restricted by local legislation to being functionally identical to an ISP, it'd be much the same as outlawing them & hard to see why anyone would use one.

 

5 hours ago, rwillett said:

Since the govt uses VPNs all the time, unlikely to happen.

 

Absolutely. Because our elected representatives are entirely committed to the principle of level-playing-field fairness, and have never so much as heard the expression 'one rule for us, and another for you'.

[TimR]

1 minute ago, Bassassin said:

All the time VPN providers make a big selling point of keeping no records of user traffic & never, ever making any records they do hold available to external scrutiny (which may or may not be true!) then that seems improbable.

 

You don't need to collect user data. You just need to block IPs. They already do this for known malicious Websites. 

[Bassassin]

12 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

You don't need to collect user data. You just need to block IPs. They already do this for known malicious Websites. 

 

Why would a VPN provider based outside of the UK (as I expect most are) be interested in, never mind compliant with local restrictions?

[rwillett]

5 hours ago, TimR said:

 

Ha. Yes.

 

I'm not talking about banning VPNs. I'm talking about fixing a white list to VPN software. 

 

Although I'm not sure of the exact mechanics behind VPNs. 

 

Edit: you're essentially using the VPN services server as an ISP. So yes, it would be pretty simple to do. 

Unless you ban foreign based VPN’s thats a pointless activity. Anything like a white listed VPN isnt a VPN at all.

 

i run a VPN system at home , i use it to access my home systems from

abroad whilst not exposing any ports.  I can chose the ports i use so no such rhing as standard ports to block. 

 

The Internet was explicitly designed to work around problems such as Washington being nuked and large swathes of infrastructure not being there. Unless the UK govt puts a firewall around the uk (aka China) and stops all traffic, it is a pointless activity.

 

[TimR]

14 hours ago, rwillett said:

Unless you ban foreign based VPN’s thats a pointless activity. Anything like a white listed VPN isnt a VPN at all.

 

The VPN we use at work is. 

 

But as @Bassassin points out, very hard to do as everyone would just use an offshore VPN server. Unless, of course, those VPN servers are also blacklisted. 

Edited December 21, 2024 by TimR

[Gasman]

Does anybody remember the panic over the introduction of the GDPR personal data protection regulations? 

 

A bit of hazard analysis and form-filling, then nothing unless some particularly egregious data misappropriation occurs. Hopefully the same with this flustercluck...

 

If you want an example of a data, technology and user management system with real teeth, have a look at the US ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) - God help you if you transgress anywhere in the world - they will come for you, shut you down, fine you millions and lock you up... (probably with Bubba as a cellmate...)