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Posted on 02/24/2008 9:37:06 PM PST by plan2succeed.org
Story title: Child Porn Suspect Ordered to Stand Trial; Man Accused of Accessing Images on Unfiltered Library Computer
A computer glitch actually prevents the library from protecting a criminal from arrest!
Story excerpt:
ROYAL OAK - When James Mullaney got timed out of his computer session at Royal Oak Public Library, James Boothe said he logged on to the same terminal and was appalled at the screen that appeared.
"It was child pornography," Boothe told 44th District Court Judge Terrence Brennan. "...I was taken aback by the images and I got up immediately and notified the desk."
The computer screen showed four pictures of a girl who appeared to be under the age of 12 having sex with an adult male and one picture of a young girl posing naked, according to another witness.
....
Defense attorney Pamela Johnson argued against sending the case to trial, relying partly on testimony from the library's information technology specialist, Eric Hayes.
Hayes told the court that the library's software is supposed to delete information left open on a computer at the end of the one-hour sessions but there was a glitch Feb. 5.
"It doesn't work all the time," Hayes testified.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailytribune.com ...
Ah, America’s noble librarians, always concerned to protect child molestors, terrorists, and assorted other dangerous scumbags at public expense...... I’m sure when ol’ Ben Franklin started the first public library he was especially concerned to pave the way for future purveyors of child pornography.
ping - look at this - has a library computer glitch actually prevented a criminal from being protected by the American Library Association’s effort to get libraries to destroy computer records due to the ALA’s opposition to the USA PATRIOT Act?
We tried putting a filter on our home computer after someone cracked into our computer and porn started popping up. It was really irritating but the filter was worse! It actually blocked FreeRepublic.
Exactly. Does this article look to you like the smoking gun it looks to me?
Librarians — protectors of the porn.
So you want library computers to cache all the email you read, your web searches, etc?
If you used a library computer and got your identity stolen because of this glitch, you’d think that was ok because a bad guy might have also got caught by saving the info?
Its probably designed to protect other personal information - like it the computer is being used for a job search or email or anything by children - so flushing to protect private information isn’t objectionable - we don’t (or at least should not) routinely spy on people without cause...
But in this case if evidence was left anyway and discovered accidentally I don’t see why they cannot use it to prosecute.
See my answer to cryptical.
Try looking into Kim Kommando’s site, she has lots of tips and links to free protection for your computer.
>>The point is many libraries did not destroy such data until the ALA opposed the USA PATRIOT Act and “suggested” local libraries do the same.<<
Assuming that is correct, I’m not sure how it effects my points that such deletion is reasonable but since it failed in this case and the evidence was discovered by accident that they should have prosecuted.
Well, that’s two of the Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse that you’ve invoked to convince me that giving up privacy is for the greater good, but I’m still not convinced.
It’s a shame that it took the Patriot Act to get libraries to think about protecting the privacy of their customers. It’s a shame that people are still under the mistaken impression that giving up liberty for security will leave them with either one.
Remember, only in a police state is the job of a policeman easy.
Thanks for the tip. It’s appreciated.
“Thanks for the tip. It’s appreciated.”
You are most welcome. let me know if you need specific help, that’s what FRiends are for.
“Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse” — funny!
Right. "If you're doing nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear", isn't that how the Big Lie goes...?
What goes around, comes around. Maybe plan2succeed.org has a home computer, so they don't rely on the ones in the local library.
But some day, after plan2succeed.org's idea of saving computer sessions becomes the law, they (or someone they know) will have to use a library computer for some personal business because their home computer is futzed, and a few minutes later an identity thief will read their undeleted session data and rob them blind. Or maybe some government official will do it for them, by leaving a CD or tape with their personal data unerased and a bad guy gets it...
I don't say that's good -- it's bad. And I don't wish it on anybody. But sooner or later, it'll happen.
Privacy is the place where liberty dwells. If you compromise privacy in the name of security, liberty suffers. If you give up privacy, liberty dies.
Perhaps true but not the point. See post 10.
Sounds like an excellent way to frame someone. Jump on the computer after them, bring up some illegal images and then complain to the librarian.
Well, I hate the damned terrorists as much as anybody, and am all in favor of destroying them utterly. We can do that without compromising liberty and privacy, and that's the way to do it. What's the point of fighting the foreign bad guys in defense of our freedom, if we willingly give it up to the domestic government? Is that what our Founders envisioned? I think not.
The fact that the public libraries were slow to catch onto the privacy issues of public computers, doesn't mean they shouldn't try to protect EVERYONE's (not just the terrorists') privacy once they get hipped to it. Pointing to the ALA and claiming they are the problem is a distraction.
I think where you and I see things differently is that you believe no one in the U.S. (government or otherwise) would ever do you harm in their efforts to catch terrorists. But I am not nearly so sanguine.
For today, we are lucky -- our Nation is still free enough that we have the luxury of agreeing to disagree on the details, while we both work to keep America the Land of Liberty.
Lots of librarians are actually creeped out that the library has turned into a free adult arcade. They didn't get their Master's for that. See Neighborhood Pornucopia. One of them writes:
Why must staff and patrons (some young adults and preteens) be forced to accept in their midst sexually aroused individuals who come to the library specifically to attain that level of arousal via Internet porn? This behavior is not socially acceptable in any other public venue.
This is not a question of censorship but one of patron and staff safety.
I am one of the creeped out Librarians, but, I have the backing of the State of Georgia to deal with the creeps. Because the state runs our internet service, they control everything. If we catch someone doing porn, we kick them out of the building, if they get caught again, they get banned, not just from our branch, but, any branch in our system. They break the ban, they get charged with criminal tresspass.
Our computers shut down after every use and all data is scrubbed off. We have a number of folks who do legal personal things on our systems and it protects them. It comes down to me and my fellow employees to do what we can to monitor use.
Word must have gotten round, because we don’t have that much problem with porn anymore.
Mike Huckabee, is that you?
Interesting story about the arrest in my home-town library. I live in Royal Oak, Michigan, and my family [my wife, two daughters, ages 5 and 9, and I] are regular patrons of our library, which we visit ~20 times a year.
I was entering the library just as Royal Oak’s finest were escorting Mr. Mullaney from the building. I went to the front desk, and admonished the librarian to not call the cops on me for the overdue books I was returning that afternoon. [I made a mildly humorous comment on how strict the library is on overdue books.] I then asked the librarian why the man was under arrest, and he briefly explained what happened.
The story as posted on this site is accurate, as far as I can determine from librarians I have spoken to and by local media accounts.
I am not interested in discussing the ALA or the ACLU or the merits of the Patriot Act; my concern is my local library. Some of you may perhaps see this story as a symbol of some national agenda. I see this as something that has happened two miles from my home, to librarians that I know by first name, at a library that has received regular contributions from our family, at a place where I regularly take my children.
Setting the story straight: Filtering software implementation has been the regular topic of discussion at our library since 1997, well before the Patriot Act. The current policy is that filtering software is installed on all the computers in the children’s and young adult areas of the library. The computers in the adult section are, and has been since installation, unfiltered.
I disagree with the comment in an earlier post that librarians are “always concerned to protect child molestors [sic], terrorists, and assorted other dangerous scumbags” - what a poppycock statement! I KNOW our librarians! NOTHING could be further from the truth!
Our librarians are standing for the American value of free speech.
Free speech, in a free country. Imagine that.
Yes, there are limits to free speech. And, I am confident that the courtroom of Judge Brennen will determine the truth of this matter.
Tomorrow night, however, when the Royal Oak City Council discusses the matter of internet filtering at our library, I will ask to speak in defense of free speech; no government censorship - no filtering.
Beware the government that wishes to filter what you are allowed to see.
“Beware the government that wishes to filter what you are allowed to see.”
This, of course, is baloney. Filtering pornography on taxpayer-funded public library computers in no way restricts what any person is free to see in the privacy of his own home, at his own expense, on his own computer.
Filtering library computers prevents taxpayers from being forced to pay to provide a free peep show facility, and protects children from being forced to share the public library with men who come to the library specifically to access Internet porn.
I did testify before the Royal Oak city commission in favor of filtering, and commissioners voted unanimously to instruct the library board to amend its policy so as to filter or otherwise block access via library computers to pornographic material. We’ll see if the library board obeys, or whether it may be necessary for the city to adopt a city charter provision requiring it by law.
As is already the case with all libraries that receive federal funding for Internet access, under a 2000 law sponsored by McCain.
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