"Google Subpoena"-related Expert Report On Censorware Now Released

[Small scoop, though several reporters will probably have items shortly - updated with full report ]

The expert witness censorware report which set off the media frenzy Google Subpoena has now been released, almost completely. There are only some small redactions having to do with specific numbers related to various sizes of search engine indexes, which the companies regard as proprietary information.

I was on a list of recipients who inquired and received the full text in a mailing when it was approved for release by the Department Of Justice. As the report will probably show up on the big search blogs, I'll save my disk space and let them post it. It's not all that, err, sexy, anyway.

Money shot:

V. SUMMARY

This study reports on the Google and MSN indexes, on AOL, MSN and Yahoo! queries, and on the most popular Wordtracker queries. About 1 percent of the websites in the Google and MSN indexes are sexually explicit. About 6 percent of queries retrieve a sexually explicit website. Nearly 40 percent of the most popular queries retrieve a sexually explicit website. Close to 90 percent of the sexually explicit websites retrieved by queries are domestic. Filters that block more of the sexually explicit websites also block more of the clean websites. The most restrictive filter blocks about 94 percent of the sexually explicit search results, but also blocks about 13 percent of the clean results. Of the sexually explicit websites that get through the filters, 30 percent to 90 percent are domestic.

The number of sexually explicit websites is huge. Search results often include sexually explicit material. A lot of sexually explicit material is not blocked by filters. Of that, a substantial percentage is domestic.

[But we all knew that last paragraph already ...]

[Update: Looks like nobody else bothered:-), and it turns out I can host it, so here it is:]

Main Report:

http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/archives/copa-censorware-stark-report.pdf

Supplement:

http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/archives/copa-censorware-stark-supp.pdf

Supplement 2:

http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/archives/copa-censorware-stark-supp2.pdf

By Seth Finkelstein | posted in censorware , copa , google | on November 13, 2006 01:33 AM (Infothought permalink)

Seth Finkelstein's Infothought blog (Wikipedia, Google, censorware, and an inside view of net-politics) - Syndicate site (subscribe, RSS)