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CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY CENSORS NET ACCESS FOR MEMBERS

Something to consider.

Operation Clambake presents:

INTERNATIONAL
PRESS RELEASE:

CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY CENSORS
NET ACCESS FOR MEMBERS
CensorWare Software May Cause Increase In ISP Support Calls.
July 1998
6th July 1998 (ARSCC Press Agency) - The controversy over the use of censorware software entered a new phase this month, with the revelation that a CD issued by the Church of Scientology to its members contains a hidden filter designed to prevent them from using their Internet connection to read a wide range of web pages, email and newsgroups which contain words that the Church of Scientology has determined to be "off limits" to Scientologists. Of particular concern to ISP's will be the fact that, because of the way that the software censors text at the protocol level, it interferes with the dialog for any transaction containing a forbidden word, and does so in such a way as to cause the TCP/IP connection to fail, apparently inexplicably. For ISP's providing service to individuals with such software installed, the result can only be an increase in the number of support calls received by people experiencing problems with email downloads or WWW pages, imposing an additional and wholly undeserved burden on such ISP's.
A group of regular posters to the Internet newsgroup alt.religion.scientology, having had sight of the Church of Scientology's censorware software, has commenced the task of analysing its operation in order to determine the methods by which it works, the list of banned words and phrases, and how, if it is required, the software can be deinstalled.
Significant progress has already been made, with the identification of the files which constitute the censorware, how they interfere with the normal running of the networking protocol stack in Windows, and a first cut at the contents of the ban lists. Much work remains to be done: at present, it is not known how the lists are stored in memory and how the software itself uses the lists to block access to the forbidden sites. We are, however, confident that the progress made so far will continue unabated, and that we will be in a position to fully document the operation of this filter in the near future.