These days, everyone is conscious of their security. It is a natural instinct of humans, inset into us when our species first roamed the Earth with dinosaurs. Back then it was all about survival, now it is simply an issue of safety. Regardless, people are concerned with security, and after the advent of the Information Generation, concerned with their online security. It makes sense, online security is tied to all other securities in life. Consider someone worried about a criminal finding out where their home is, and attacking them, stealing from them, or kidnapping them or their children; how do you think the criminal found out where the house is? Criminals have enjoyed technological increases as well; instead of the old stalk and follow procedures, they can simply track an open IP address.

It is not just the United States who are advanced technologically enough to be worried about these things; Europeans are currently undergoing an Orwellian crisis. A new law that proposes that local authorities will be able to monitor all activity that occurs on the Internet completely unchecked has nearly ten thousand protesters lined up to fight against this movement happening. It seems ironic; these laws are in place to help the people and to track criminals, monitor child pornographers, etc. People are suspicious though, as is our nature. The government has done too many strange things and hurt too many people all over for the people to completely trust them.

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Remember the much anticipated Green Dam software that was to be installed on every computer in China? This software was supposed to have all sorts of blocking technology that would censor pornographic content from every computer, regardless of age or consent. With this installed, no Chinese citizen could access these sites. While it is quite an un-American notion to block someone from viewing something, it is acceptable to think that the government may be blocking content that they don’t qualify for age-wise, it seems they may have some ulterior motives. Consider the fact that along with pornography, they block all sorts of sites pertaining to anti-communist, or any banned spiritual movements. The banned movement of Falun Gong is always under fire by the Chinese for influencing their citizens, and because of this they have censored him in pretty much every medium.

The proposal initially was slated to have the software released on every computer in China, yet the public revolted against this. The software was to be mandatory installation on every computer, and the computer manufacturers were expected to incur these costs themselves. They didn’t like this, because they had to spend more money employing people to download it, while they charged the citizens the same amount, and therefore, were losing money. The citizens didn’t like it because through this, no matter what their age, they were blocked from the content. While the intention of blocking kids from pornographic content is a good and noble idea, blocking adults who are well over the required age is not. There are many holes in their plan as well. They did not consider that the people wouldn’t just roll over and endure this injustice, and they certainly did not. They fought and fought and almost boycotted the buying of computers until the software was deactivated. Turns out, they won their battle.

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