Tens of millions of UK broadband customers have dismissed fears that their households are meccas of muck, after an Ofcom report showed very low take-up of adult filtering services.
The measure, aimed at protecting children from harmful websites was agreed between major Internet service providers and the Government last year. BT, Sky and TalkTalk implemented the tools by the December 2013 deadline, while Virgin Media introduced it in February.
But uptake of the filters among new customers stands at just 4% for Virgin Media, 5% for BT, and 8% for Sky, although TalkTalk bucks the trend on 36%.
The ISPs will begin contacting their existing customers to present them with the same opt-out choice before the end of the year.
According to the report, all four ISPs have commissioned third parties to perform the categorisation of Internet content and services. Alongside the common classifications, some ISPs have also introduced supplementary categories in their filtering services, covering areas such as alcohol and tobacco, media streaming, hacking, dating, games and fashion.
However, the Open Rights Group claims ISPs now block one in five websites, including political and feminist blogs.
In January, responding to the complaints of ‘over-blocking’, the Government introduced a ‘whitelist’ maintained by a special working group within the UK Council for Child Internet Safety, which was designed to stop automatic filters from blocking legitimate, age-appropriate websites.
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Millions give porn filters the finger http://t.co/9y2q6w5Ayx #digitalmarketing