News Culture Secretary targets search engines

"Music industry fatcats not making enough cash; government intervenes"

-_-

 

It's child porn that disgusts me the most. They should be focusing on that rather than the record industry losing a few sales on itunes. Besides who uses a search engine these days to look for free music downloads? Anyone who does download music already knows where to get it and won't ever use a search engine.

 

Bunch of tools, the lot of them. Doesn't help that no matter which government we elect in, this rubbish will still occur. I still hold the firm belief that 95% of politicians are only there because they can't do a job well elsewhere that's better paid.

Hopefully Vince Cable will be unable to keep the copyright lobbyists stable. The record labels should just disable their motions so that we may enable this whole debacle to be reduced to a fable.

 

You forget that The City of London Police are only concerned with the square mile, they are nothing more than the financial sectors lackeys caring more about protecting bankers and corporations than us normal folk.

 

And protecting Muslim extremists like Anjem Choudary but that's for another thread.

 

Or being wined and dinned by scientologists, being bribed, etc, etc. Lets face it they are about as crooked as it's possible for any "Police" force to be.

 

Making threats to Google, yeah I can see that ending well

 

You wont be calling 999 if your ever unfortunate enough to be a victim of a crime then.

 

Why would you dial 999 if you were a victim of crime?
What a rose tinted view of quaint british life you have.
You need to step out into the real world and have a real look at what the police think about Joe public, they don't give a toss mate. It is all about the statistics.
The police are as far removed from conventional society as you can possibly imagine.
Everytime i have had the necessity to report a crime, like my car being stolen, like my home being burgled, like reporting a dead person lying on a footpath ( YES! really). They have been disinterested and often dismissive of there actually been a crime.
My local police force up in Cleveland, must be the worst bunch of ramble since the Serious Crime Agency of the 70's and 80's.
A heap of them in prison now ( quite a few for rape and serious drug offences), lots suspended pending investigation, bribery, corruption in a public office and endless cases of destroyed evidence and perjury.

Just incase you get the wrong idea of why i might bring this up and assume i am a somewhat undesirable scruff, may i point out that i am 49 yr old married man, who has been employed by the Private health sector for the last 20yrs to facilitate specialist care to Young Onset Dementia sufferers with Huntingtons Disease.

I have NEVER had an incident that involved the Police, where i felt confident that my concerns were being dealt with to a satisfactory standard.
I may be an isolated case, but i somehow doubt it.
The Police farce in this country is a corporate and political whore, who willingly roll over for anybody that has either the influence or the financial clout to ask.

 

They do organise great "Through the Keyhole" tours of Cliff Richards' house though.

 

Oh I forgot.
I once waited 3 days for the Police to come and see me when my Home was burgled.
The Victim Support people made it in 2 hours.
Always brings a chuckle that one.
When the Police (well PCSO actually), did come they said it was hardly worth reporting as a crime as the only thing stolen was a bicycle and some power tools under a 500 pound total.
They told me it would probably not be put down as a crime, and that i should contact my insurance company to see if i can claim.

 

What I found was funny was that the schematics for Cliff Richards house were provided to the police Force by THE BBC.

I bet he will not do anymore BBC Christmas Specials then..

 

This. Short of a one time Google of "pirate bay proxies" no self respecting copyright thief would ever go near a search engine these days.

 

If I put my tinfoil hat on for a moment, I wonder if it is not really about copyright protection any more than the "right to be forgotten" is about people's right to privacy. I wonder if it is just the start of a systematic attempt by governments to control public access of information on the internet.

Imposing filtering on ISPs of political dissent inconvenient truths public empowerment porn and terrorism sites is one part of the plan. Imposing filtering on search engines is another. I wonder what is next.

 

999 is just an emergency telephone number, what police force deals with the crime is dependent on the location that the call is being made from. If you happened to be unfortunate enough to call from the square mile then yes it would be dealt with by the many (750) full-time police officers they have.

Maybe if everywhere in the UK had 750 police for every square mile none of us would be a victim of crime, sadly we don't have the money to pay for so many officers.

 

Regardless if its child porn or copyrighted music or info someone no longer wants on the web, targeting search engines is stupid.

Is there a need for a system to remove certain content from the internet?

Yes.

However there is also a need that it comes with conditions:

1: Only content that is illegal enough to stand up to challenge in a court can be removed.
2: The content needs to be actually removed and not just blocked.
3: Massive financial penalties for abusing the system need to be in place.

 

Whenever these stories rear their heads again, it just reminds me that these ministers have little to no idea of how the internet, and search engines, work.

 

In fairness, most square miles of the UK don't have the best part of a third of a million people working in them and aren't highly valuable terrorist targets.

While I don't doubt everything you say, I think like Corky says, it does vary enormously which force you are dealing with. I've only ever had to deal with them a couple of times, once in London and once in Essex, and I have to say they were pretty good both times.

I don't think you need to be wearing a tinfoil hat for that, I strongly suspect you're (rather depressingly) bang on the money.

 

Oh, and I meant to add - completely agree with Anfield as well.