Google Filters Gaggle Non-Porn Sites: Report

Merely by a "proprietary algorithim" that analyzes Web pages and makes "an educated guess," without human intervention, Google's SafeSearch filter is blocking a lot more than just adult Internet content, according to a newly-released report - by the same Berkman Center for Internet & Society analyst who just had his First Amendment lawsuit against a Net filtering software maker thrown out by a federal judge.

"For lack of human review of SafeSearch's filtering decisions, Google readily admits that its system is not completely accurate," wrote Benjamin Edelstein, who added that he knew of no independent analysis yet of SafeSearch's actual performance. Edelstein suggested SafeSearch "overblock(s)...at least tens of thousands of pages, and more likely hundreds of thousands or even millions, that do not meet SafeSearch's stated filtering criteria."

SafeSearch can be enabled or disabled by way of a preferences page, and therein may lie the heart of the problem, according to CNET.com. "That technique reduces the cost of the SafeSearch service, but it can lead to odd results," the tech news Website said. "It's perhaps unlikely that many humans would have classified a BBC News report on East Timor, Mattel's site about its Scrabble game -- the URL includes the word "adults"--or the Nashville Public Library's teen health issues page as unsuitable for minors. Some articles from CNET News.com and CNET Software are also invisible to SafeSearch users."

But Google vice president for business development David Drummond argued that SafeSearch is supposed to be what he called "over-inclusive," telling CNET they chose to err on the side of caution . "The thinking was that SafeSearch was an opt-in feature," he said. "People who turn it on care a lot more about something sneaking through than they do about something getting filtered out."