On Jun 28, 2006, at 5:51 AM, Harald Alvestrand wrote:
Shouting "pedophile" or "terrorist" tends to shut down reasoned debate
in most public spaces, and reduce the respect for facts to a level
that is far below any level I'm willing to enter into debate on.
I agree. But the fact that people are hysterical doesn't necessarily
mean there isn't a problem at all, either. Statistically, parents
should be more worried about their kids not getting vaccinated than
about them being abused by a stranger. But when such horrors actually
happen, statistical arguments are no comfort to the unlucky parents,
and neither the media nor politicians can resist using their suffering
to increase ratings or garner votes.
As engineers and scientists we have to be more rational about these
topics than the general public, but we still have to take them
seriously. If the Internet has caused even one additional case of
child abuse, then all of us who have helped build the Internet bear
some responsibility to confront the problem.
It would be good if we had a clear, non-technical statement showing how
the IETF is working on technologies which, in the long run, can help
with tracing and apprehending the bad guys while preserving privacy.
We need to make it clear to the rest of the world that we as an
institution are opposed to child abuse (and terrorism, for that matter)
and are making a sincere effort to find effective and appropriate
countermeasures. Otherwise, I predict that ineffective and
inappropriate countermeasures will eventually be forced upon us.
None of the above should be construed as meaning that I think these
problems are solvable. But if anyone is going to be worrying about
these things and looking for solutions, it should be us, because anyone
else is likely to do far worse. -- Nathaniel
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