Charities want all ISPs to use child abuse filtering list

Children’s charities are calling on the Government to force internet service providers (ISPs) to do more to filter access to child abuse websites.

Around 700,000 households in the UK can still easily access these sites, according to the NSPCC, because some ISPs have failed to implement the Internet Watch Foundation's (IWF) blocking list.

The IWF is a charity that works with the police and ISPs to remove images from the internet of children being sexually abused. It produces a list, provided free to IWF affiliates, of between 800 and 1,200 websites, which it updates daily. When used with filtering software, this list can help ISPs block these illegal websites and stop people from accidentally stumbling across them.

Because of the success that the IWF has had in monitoring these sites and getting many taken down, in April 2006 the Government asked all ISPs in the UK to use the charity's list by 31 December 2007 on a voluntary basis.

Now the NSPCC and other children's charities say the voluntary approach has failed and the Government should now make using the list a mandatory condition.

John Carr, chairman of the Children’s Coalition, said: "The Government needs to put its foot down and say the industry has two months to sort itself out or it will legislate."

However, one ISP that is not using the list said it would not help combat the problem of removing sites hosting images of child abuse. A representative for Zen Internet said: "We have not yet implemented the recommended IWF system because we have concerns over its effectiveness."

The ISP refused to elaborate on why it thought the IWF list was ineffective but Peter Robbins, chief executive of the IWF, said Zen was missing the point.

"The list won’t stop people who are actively looking for sites containing images of child abuse; that is a matter for the police. But it will help people accidentally stumbling across these," he said.

Not everyone agrees that legislation is the answer. Richard Clayton, a security expert at Cambridge University, pointed out that not many people did come across the images by accident.

"This material tends to be held on paid-for sites or is held by people who don't publish it to the world because they don't want to get arrested," he said.

"It’s a waste of parliamentary time to push for legislation. The thing to do is to improve the system so ISPs globally are called as soon as possible and informed of the website in question," he said.

Alan Campbell, Home Office minister, said that the Government is currently looking at ways to get the final five per cent of ISPs not currently using the list to use it.