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Comment by bkoa | Hacker News Reader

Why do HN people feel the need to portray everything the US federal government goes after as a martyr for free speech? Of all the Internet-related crimes, I think stopping pornography depicting minors is one of the least controversial laws to possibly enforce. I know it's more convenient to group everything the FBI, CIA, and NSA do into an "obviously evil" bin, but sometimes you need to appreciate enough nuance to not defend all their online targets on principle. If this isn't one of those times, I don't know what is.

Just like they can always make the argument that they are protecting people with xyz questionable tactics, you can always make the claim that something on the Internet is for the purposes of free speech. That doesn't make you right, or even mean that free speech is the primary legal or moral distinguishing factor even if you are.

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> I think stopping pornography depicting minors is one of the least controversial laws to possibly enforce.

While it might be uncontroversial, some people would still prefer if the state used effective and evidence-based methods to prevent child abuse, rather than using ineffective, costly, and what ever method that get most media attention.

For example, mandating that schools has trained counsels at staff is a prime example in identifying and preventing child abuse. Having a trained expert which kids, parents and teachers can go to is important line of defense. New teachers should also receive basic training when studying at the university, so they can detect psychological, emotional, social, and physical signs of abuse.

Current studied methods in creating effective prevention program also includes group-based sexual abuse prevention education for children (http://www.princeton.edu/futureofchildren/publications/docs/...). Sadly, the efforts in creating more effective prevention efforts is sadly somewhat low priority (see linked document).

It should also be noted, that in that whole document, more strict Internet regulation is not mentioned at all as effective prevention method. Feel free to speculate widely why the researchers did not mention it.

From what I can tell, the issue is that there has so far been no evidence that this move will do anything to actually prevent the distribution of child pornography. That is, it might be collateral damage without fulfilling its primary objective.

I was thinking the same thing... While I agree that hosting cp is definitely a problem. Going after the service provider does not get to the root of the actual problem. Having said that, the story is quite young so I guess we will have to wait and see what transpires.

So? It's pretty clear that the owner knowingly allowed it and perhaps even promoted it. It's obvious that this person broke a serious law. Should the FBI just turn a blind eye because shutting down a hosting service won't be 100% effective at eliminating that content forever? No. We don't prosecute any crime conditionally on the basis of how effective that specific prosecution is at eliminating current/future instances of the same crime. Just because prosecutions of some Internet-related crimes are unjust doesn't mean you should employ mental gymnastics to side with every alleged Internet criminal.

I don't dispute that this if convicted is a criminal offence. I guess I was coming from the angle that the children who are the victims should be the priority...

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