MPs get web filter 'dark ages' warning

A Microsoft executive told MPs today that forcing software companies to install internet content filtering technology with high-security settings as standard to all computers would send the UK back to the "dark ages".
The idea of forcing companies such as Microsoft to pre-install high security content filters was raised today at a Commons culture, media and sport select committee hearing on protecting children from harmful content on the internet and in video games.
Asked what he thought of the idea, Matt Lambert, head of corporate affairs at Microsoft, admitted that internet content filtering technology already provided by the company as standard with its software products was "not widely used".
But Lambert rejected the idea of a mandatory setting of content filters to a high security level, arguing that it would block too much content that posed no risk to children.
Lambert said a better solution would be for parents to be better educated about what their children are looking at online and what content filters are available.
He added that Microsoft runs a schools programme aiming to educate children about internet content and online safety.
"There has been low takeup but intriguingly there is not low awareness of it ... parents are not acting," he said.
"Setting [filtering controls] at a high level is the equivalent to blocking the internet ... it would be living in the dark ages in my view."
Lambert was responding to a suggestion made by another witness before the culture select committee today, who had said filtering software should be pre-installed at a high security setting.
John Carr, the executive secretary of the Children's Charities Coalition for Internet Safety, said that the industry could not be expected to be some sort of "moral arbiters" or "priests" for the public, deciding which content should be screened.
"In school the headteacher sets the standards surrounding internet content," Carr added. "It should be the same in the home ... there is no way we can legislate from the centre.
"The public policy challenge is in helping parents to understand the internet and in turn help children. Parents feel at sea about what to do. Safety software should be pre-installed and set to a high level."
Stephen Carrick Davies, the chief executive of Childnet International, a charitable body that promotes online safety for children, told the committee that one problem with policing the internet is that the concept of harmful content is difficult to define, unlike obviously illegal content such as child abuse images and websites.
"Illegal content is easy [to define and regulate] while harmful is difficult," said Davies. "We need to recognise there is 'grey'. There is black and white but also grey."
He also pointed out that legislation against such a "grey" area could result in curbs of freedom of expression and that in a web 2.0 world of user-generated content it can often be young people themselves - those often seen as "passive victims" - who can perpetrate cyber bullying online.
Davies suggested the answer might lie in a three-pronged approach. He said this strategy would involve self-regulation by the industry; empowering, supporting and educating schools; and making sure that parents help children so they are savvy enough and "equipped just as how they are when they walk down the high street".