WIKIPEDIA PROMOTES CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

Wikipedia, an online edition owned by the not-for-profit Wikimedia Foundation, was removed from the child porn blacklist by the Internet Watch Foundation. Last week under instructions from the IWF, several major UK ISPs began censoring a Wikipedia article dedicated to Virgin Killer, a 1976 record album from German heavy metal band The Scorpions. The album's original cover includes the image of a naked prepubescent girl whose genitals are covered only by what appears to be a cracked camera lens.

Actually, after the release of Virgin Killer, the controversial album cover was replaced by another in the US and the UK and was banned in other countries. Earlier this month the IWF received a complaint about the image and having considered the case decided to add Wikipedia to a blacklist designed to protect the customers of ISPs and other companies from accidental view of an indecent image of a child.

Thus on the grounds of IWF’s decision six ISPs such as Virgin Media, Be Unlimited/O2/Telefonica, EasyNet/UK Online, PlusNet, Demon, and Opal started filtering all Wikipedia traffic through a small number of transparent proxy servers. There were cases when ISPs blocked the entire Wikipedia article instead of just the image. This led to impediments to accept edits from the world. On the score of the heavy funneling of traffic through proxies a great number of alleged UK editors tried to ‘vandalize’ the encyclopedia. In order to prevent this Wikipedia administrators had no choice but to ban editing from most of the UK. Editors with registered accounts were not affected.

This week after complaints from across the web, the IWF revised its decision and announced that in the light of the length of time the image has existed and its wide availability the British net censor removes this web page from the blacklist. While Wikimedia is expressing its pleasure some people say that it may result in undermining power of law in many countries as long as the fact that this image is still there prompts its legal use.