From declan@well.com Tue Jun 20 12:47:38 2000 Date: Tue, 20 Jun 2000 15:43:59 -0400 From: Declan McCullagh To: declan@well.com Subject: bair Date Mon, 12 Jun 2000 202257 -0400 To daveepler@exotrope.com From Declan McCullagh Subject Followup query about BAIR blocking (or not) Cc beech90@exotrope.com Dave, Thanks for your help. I am now connecting via Wired's internal network, with a static IP address for the duration of the connection. My IP address (shown in winipcfg) and the IP address as seen from the remote web site (according to its logs) are identical. They do not change over the course of the dialup connection. Now, on to BAIR -- This web site, which I told you about, is blocked by BAIR http//www.well.com/user/declan/bairtest/ But, oddly, a byte-for-byte identical copy is *not* blocked http//www.well.com/user/declan/bt/ The only explanation I have for the above is that you inadvertently added the /bairtest directory to your proxy server's off-limits list of URLs, even though you told me you had not. Also, not all the images in that directory are sexually explicit. Yet a picture of a metal gear is blocked http//www.well.com/user/declan/bairtest/Ballstretch-8.jpg It is not blocked here http//www.well.com/user/declan/bt/Ballstretch-8.jpg Even images in the /bairtest directory with nonexistent names are blocked with the now-familiar BAIR graphic http//www.well.com/user/declan/bairtest/nonexistent.jpg Also, you told me this directory would be blocked soon, but it is not http//www.mccullagh.org/theme/nudes.html I'm trying to figure out why this is happening. Any ideas? -Declan Wired News Date Tue, 13 Jun 2000 182021 -0400 To "Dave Epler" From Declan McCullagh Subject Re filtering Cc "Scott Beecher" Dave, I am back in my office after being out doing unrelated work today. I tried to call you, no answer. So far my experience in trying to do a straight review is disconcerting and plagued by inexplicable errors. Please call me so I can finally get a working version of the program and finish this up. -Declan Date Wed, 14 Jun 2000 111416 -0400 To "Dave Epler" From Declan McCullagh Subject Re filtering Cc "Scott Beecher" Thanks for your help. Once we got the thing working, and your logs reflected my activity, I surfed around. In five minutes of surfing, I found that BAIR blocked * 2 images on wired.com homepage * 1 image on cnn.com homepage * 3 images on time.com homepage, including pix for lead story of Syrian army officers * 1 on newsweek.com, and the lead photo on North Korea in its photo archive on a sep. page Also, my well.com/user/declan/3 directory has 50 images. 45 were porn, 4 were not, 1 was a mangled image that was not porn but was just halfway there. BAIR blocked all but the mangled image. That included four non-porn images -- including one of a piece of metal! -- that it should not have blocked. Is this expected behavior? -Declan Date Thu, 15 Jun 2000 004541 -0400 To "Dave Epler" From Declan McCullagh Subject Re filtering Cc "Scott Beecher" Dave, when we spoke around 4 pm Wednesday, you told me that my "ultra" /2 setting was working just fine and that BAIR erred on the side of caution. But you did not explain why time.com and newsweek.com were blocked. As a test, I wrote a Perl program to 1) extract 20 images randomly from a database of thousands of both pornographic and legitimate ones, 2) create a directory with a random number as its name, 3) assign each of those images random numbers in that directory. The random number prevents BAIR from knowing what is sexually explicit or not without evaluating the image. You can see the test site at http//server1.cluebot.com/jpg/ My test shows that BAIR is overzealous to the point of absurdity. The time.com and newsweek.com examples were not unusual, but represent ative. In four random trials with roughly 100 images total, BAIR incorrectly blocked dozens of legitimate images including scenery, portraits, landscapes, street scenes, still lifes, and so on. The *only* image it did not block was, ironically, a man masturbating http//server1.cluebot.com/jpg/7630/2865.jpg Is this expected behavior? -Declan Date Thu, 15 Jun 2000 124650 -0400 To "Dave Epler" From Declan McCullagh Subject Re filtering Cc "Scott Beecher" Dave, Scott, any thoughts? I haven't heard back, and I suspect you'd like to clear this up if my test is incorrect. I've generated a few more random tests for your perusal at the same URL below. This time BAIR did slightly better. Out of one set of 20, it blocked 9 porn and 9 non-porn images. It approved as OK one NYC street scene and one female genitals shot. -Declan Date Mon, 19 Jun 2000 154736 -0400 To "Dave Epler" From Declan McCullagh Subject Re filtering Cc "Scott Beecher" Just called, left message. If there's no change in BAIR's reliability, I suppose there's no need for the two of us to chat. But it might be useful to have your president on the phone to explain why BAIR bans readers from viewing news photos at time.com and newsweek.com, but rates images of oral sex, group sex, and masturbation as acceptable for youngsters. -Declan