New Software from AT&T May Benefit Internet Pornographers and Pedophiles
By Rusty Pugh
AFR News
August 15, 2000
(AgapePress) - A family advocate says new software designed by AT&T to allow anonymous postings on the Internet will benefit criminals, including pornographers and pedophiles. That anonymity is becoming easier with new encryption software developed by AT&T researcher Lorrie Cranor.
"Publius"--the name given to the software--is designed to help people publish material on the Internet that makes tracing that information very difficult, if not impossible. Bruce Taylor of the National Law Center for Children and Families says it is interesting to note that this technology is being developed by AT&T.
"Just after [AT&T] announced that they're going to go into a partnership to offer hardcore porn with a porn industry company," Taylor says, "isn't it ironic that that's one of the companies that's going to introduce technology to hide what they do on the net?"
Taylor admits that such technology could be helpful to those living in repressive countries who may be subject to religious persecution.
"But in this country, that's not what it's for," he says. "We don't have to protect ourselves from the government like other people do. In this country, the people who are going to make the first and the most extensive use of that kind of technology are the hackers, the pedophiles, the pornographers, and the terrorists."
Taylor says this type of use of technology is becoming more and more common, and that it will just make it harder for law enforcement to track pedophiles.
"It just shows you where the Internet is going," he says.
Publius was the pen name that three of America's founding fathers used to publish the Federalist Papers anonymously.
Copyright 2000, Agape Press. Used with permission.