{"id":818,"date":"2008-11-12T18:01:34","date_gmt":"2008-11-12T16:01:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.basbasbas.com\/blog\/?p=818"},"modified":"2008-11-12T18:27:58","modified_gmt":"2008-11-12T16:27:58","slug":"dutch-police-union-head-calls-for-web-censorship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.basbasbas.com\/blog\/2008\/11\/12\/dutch-police-union-head-calls-for-web-censorship\/","title":{"rendered":"Dutch Police Union Head Calls for Web Censorship"},"content":{"rendered":"

In response to the intimidation of a Dutch police woman, both on- and offline, head of police union ACP<\/a>, Geert van de Kamp, has called for web censorship.<\/strong><\/p>\n

An investigation has been launched into the intimidation of the police woman, who works for the foreign police of The Netherlands. In the night of Monday to Tuesday, unknown people vandalized the front door of the police woman’s house with red paint.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Also, the tires of the police woman’s car were slashed.<\/p>\n

A group called the Winterschilders <\/em>(Winterpainters<\/em>) claimed responsibility for the act by posting a message on indymedia.nl<\/a>, which included the full name and address of the police woman (and a picture, claims the police union<\/a>). Their message reads:<\/p>\n

\n

Tonight The Winterpainters visited XXX, foreign police, XXX, XXX. (XXX replacing her personal data which have been removed by indymedia)<\/p>\n

Her frontdoor got some red paint on it; symbol for the blood of the people that suffer due to the practices of the foreigner police.
\nWe also made sure she couldn’t get to her work quickly today (flat tires).
\nThis is a warning to all her colleagues of the modern gestapo<\/a> (foreign police, immigration and naturalisation service, justice dept.).<\/p>\n

You are responsible for what you are doing.
\nStop it.<\/p>\n

The Winterpainters<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Gerrit van de Kamp, head of police union ACP, calls the incident “unheard of”, saying this “absolutely cannot and may not happen again.” And what better way to react to Gestapo accusations than calling for censorship?<\/p>\n

Van de Kamp wants to ask the ministers of Justice and Internal Affairs to make it impossible to publish messages like the above on the internet, saying<\/a> it should be “technologically possible” to filter such messages.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Gerrit van de Kamp, you are either unaware of what exactly is “technologically possible” or<\/em> you are calling for censorship. In a statement on ACP’s website<\/a>, you call for “preventive measures to prevent name & address data of police people to be posted on the internet”. That’s a lot more nuanced and understandable, yet it is impossible to put such filters in place without seriously endangering the freedom of the citizens you’re serving. You are asking for ISPs to filter what their users are posting to the internet:<\/p>\n