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Filter-Makers Get Starry Eyed over Report

The day after N2H2 CEO Peter Nickerson testified at a House subcommittee hearing on protecting children from online smut, his firm's Bess filter had begun blocking the Starr report. The software was specially customized to override the stop command in acknowledgment of what N2H2's September 16 press release deemed "the immense historic impact of the OIC's document."

CyberPatrol decided not to filter the report for the same reason, their Web site statement explaining that the House had "determined that the American public should have access to this document." I-Gear and Net Nanny were more pragmatic about allowing access, declaring stop lists useless as mirror sites mushroomed.

"I'm guessing the White House wishes that everybody had CyberSitter to make sure no one had this information," Solid Oak Software President Brian Milburn told the CNET Internet news service September 11. He predicted CyberSitter would block passages containing terms such as "oral sex."

Posted September 21, 1998.

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