Teen Hacks $84 Million Porn Filter in 30 Minutes

An anonymous reader writes "Tom Wood, a Year 10 Australian student has cracked the federal government's $84-million Internet porn filter in just 30 minutes. He can deactivate the filter in several clicks in such a way that the software's icon is not deleted which will make his parents believe the filter is still working. Tom says it is a matter of time before some computer-savvy kid puts the bypass on the Internet for others to use."

84 million dollars?

[gozar]

Give me half that and I'll re-do their filter so some 15 year old can't get around it....

Seriously, if you're going to spend that amount of money, you'd be farther ahead putting in a router that the government controls that can be continually updated. You also get cross-platform compatibility as a bonus!

Perception

[biocute]

icon is not deleted which will make his parents believe the filter is still working

Isn't this what's important to parents? They only need to feel good, other technical details are useless.

Fucking morons.

[scenestar]

When are people going to accept that teenagers are sexual beings too.

According to wikipedia he should be around the age of 15/16
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Australi a#Secondary [wikipedia.org]

When I was 15 I remember becoming sexually active with girls and having "needs"

No filter can stop teens from getting off, no matter how many millions of dollars you throw at it.

"$84.4 million for the National Filter Scheme"

[Wilson_6500]

I've never heard of a more appropriately-named government project. $84M for a continually-updated filter that a kid (sounds like a smart kid, but a kid nonetheless) can break in less than an hour.

Why can't America's politicians up and admit to their schemes, too? Imagine it: the PATRIOT Scheme, the Communications Decency Scheme, and so on.

Re:Cheapest Solution...

[CastrTroy]

That's probably the best idea. Don't try to filter stuff, because you're either not filter everything, or filter too much. Just either put your computer in a room where you would be likely to walk by at any time, or put in some kind of proxy machine so that you can monitor what's going on. Even if they use HTTPs, you can see what IPs they are connecting to. This can help determine what they are looking at. Also, once they start looking for it, don't assume the internet is the only place they will find it. We all got a hold of it somehow when we were kids without the internet, and we all turned out pretty normal (by we, I mean just about everybody in society). For the most part, I'd just put the computer in a well travelled room. All this proxy/filter/nanny stuff is too much, and just shows a lot of distrust in your children, and probably won't stop them from seeing porn anyway.

Re:Motivated Youth

[Anonymous Coward]

You know ... what made me search for porn in my youth is exactly the fact that my parents were trying to teach me to stay away from it.

Hey, if they tell me to stay away it must be secretly gooooood....

Re:b-b-b-but

[Jules Mercuri]

I realize this is mostly a joke but actually, 99% of porn DVDs have no region coding and some have no CSS copy-protection either.

Bureaucratic Costs?

[Rog7]

84 Million? That's twice Blizzard's developing budget for World of Warcraft... for a porn filter. Seriously?

Re:Motivated Youth

[sethawoolley]

I do believe your confusing porn with something emotional and meaningful, like say a relationship. Its a quick physical release, nothing more.

It's the hedonistic pleasure part of porn that is the problem. Teach children to not engage in materialistic pleasures and they won't be so interested in porn.

That somebody might be happy... would be so bad for you, wouldn't it?

As Nietzsche says, Christianity makes the whole of life repulsive.

I for one, don't think pleasure is at all a bad thing. That meaningful relationships are much more pleasurable than porn means we really don't have to worry about it systematically, unlike your apothecary soul.

I do worry, no I pity those who live life in constant repression.

Just look at what you Christians cherish -- pity, guilt, sin -- not to mention guilt through inheritance, which no rational society anymore recognizes.

May Christianity be the last, dying Hellenistic Mystery Religion.

Re:Another Solution...

[bussdriver]

A teen need not seek out porn when he just has to find girls that will put out; and those are more common as women gain more social equality and freedom.

Some teens might be better with the porn than diseases or their own children. How about a study on the impact porn has on teen sex related problems?

Physically adulthood is sooner than our cultural adulthood (the mental threshold IS cultural) and therein lies the bulk of the problem. The whole issue is a cultural one which as a result has little fact or logical foundation and more to do with belief, dogma, tradition, peer pressure, etc... Religion and SIMILAR belief structures should be prevented from getting into government. Its a core reason for having a Republic as opposed to an actual Democracy; protect the minority from the majority.

Non-Disclaimer: I will not cave into judgmental self-centered people who think other people can't understand points of view that they do not agree with.

A Parent's Perspective

[CrankyOldBastard]

A few years back I found my eldest son (12 at the time( was using the small dark hours to view various kinds of porn. Some was 'normal' but there were many sites that were et the more extreme end of human sexuality.

I set up a transparent proxy with Dansguardian. Do I think it's impossible for my kids to find porn (or other content I'm uncomfortable for my kids to see) ? No. But I do know that it's unlikely for them to stumble across it accidentally. If they set to work to find and view porn, they'll find a way around the filters.

I also took a few of the images C. had looked at, and by zooming and playing with palettes showed him the scars of self-mutilation, the scars from slashed wrists, the track marks, the rotting teeth and the sores. He now knows that many of the girls have pretty nasty problems, as well as nasty habits. He also can see that many of the girls are being exploited, and that porn denigrates humans, unlike art which glorifies the body or casts these girls onto the canvas of our own life to challenge our our nice safe prejudices.

I know if my kids view porn. They know that I know. I also know that they have at least a glimmering of some of the moral and social issues involved. Hopefully I've also provided some guidance about what constitutes 'normal' and what the difference is between sex as an act of love and sex as exploitation for purposes of ego stroking.

So my approach as a parent is (1) make it less likely that they'll find porn by accident (2) make sure they're game to talk to me about it (3) make sure they see woman as more than a set of orifices in a warm bundle (4) make sure they know that their dreams and urges are normal and (5) that they are the only ones who can decide whether they treat Human Beings with respect as Divine Creatures deserve.

I figure that if (however unlikely) I can make some headway on all these points, I'll have got some wins, and their chances of happy future relationships are (slightly?) improved. I think thats my job - the rest is up to them.

Re:Motivated Youth

[LanMan04]

Personally I quit teh pr0n because I eventually ended up having incredibly screwed up thoughts run through my head, the kind of stuffs rapists are made out of. =P So don't tell me there's nothing wrong with it, I know first hand what can happen to kids if you put strange/sexually violent thoughts in to their heads. On the other hand, I had parents who entirelly supressed all that kind of stuff, and I ended up associating sex with sin and darkness and bad and such, so it's no suprise that when I couldn't help but obey my nature that it all came out skewed. So for a solid three months, as an eighteen year old male teenager, I willingly supressed every sexual thought I had, until I decided I had the will to maintain I healthy balance. Now I'm fine, for the most part.

So you're blaming porn for your fucked up thoughts, instead of your parents doing a piss-poor job of teaching you about sex? The (probable) reason "teh pr0n" made you have dark/rape sex fantasies is because your parents totally fucked up your understanding of sex.

Non-fucked up understanding of sex + porn = normal person, masturbation, quick physical release
Repressed, fucked up understanding of sex + porn = probably fucked up person in terms of sexuality, hangups, fear, etc

Only one variable has been changed on the left side of the equation. Hint: it's not porn. Call your parents and thank them for putting you through that hellish period when you were 18. It's their fault.

BTW, I speak from experience; my wife had a similar Christian upbringing (if you tell me your parents aren't Born Again, I'll be very surprised), and it took her quite a while to work out most of her sex hangups. It still makes her feel weird/dirty sometimes, all because of her parents' inability/lack of maturity when it came to an uncomfortable topic: talking to your kids about sex.

Re:Motivated Youth

[zenhkim]

> since God knew that he had set up Adam and Eve for failure, he gave them a reproductive system? He knew that they would fall? What a fucking evil bastard.

Hell, just crack open a Bible to the Old Testament and read the Book of Job -- and I mean *really* read it. God bumps into Satan as both survey the earth. God boasts to Satan about how devoted a worshipper the man Job is. Satan points out that Job wouldn't be quite as enthusiastic to worship God if great misfortune befell the man. So God bets Satan that Job won't curse God to His face, even if Satan destroys Job's possessions, lays waste to his home, and slaughters his family.

Think about it: God allowed Satan to completely ruin a pious man's life -- including the killing of innocent family members -- *so that God could win a bet*.

No wonder they never covered this biblical story in Sunday School.