Could this have been prevented with Linux? OR common sense?

[Kelsay, Brian - Kansas City, MO]

(long rant)

 You're right Jim.  Every business and gov't. network should have a
proxy, a firewall, filtering software, and an AUP (Acceptable Use
Policy) signed and in place or a combination of those.  Otherwise they
can be held liable in at least a civil suit for failure to perform due
diligence to block offensive content.  Most of the IT guys I've come
across from schools have this stuff in place and it is so tight you
can't get webmail or do research on breast cancer.

That said, I think any user of the Internet is personally responsible
for what they look up.  It is fair to assume that most everyone is aware
that there is porn on the internet and that you must be careful.  We
don't know all the facts in the case, so it is very likely that the
substitute was a newish Internet user and was not necessarily surfing
porn in a class.  How dumb would that be?  She probably panicked when
the pop-ups appeared and asked the students for help.  Then several more
get up and there is your ten students.  An experienced investigator,
like on of us may be able to find that one of the students sabotaged her
computer.

What a cruel joke that she could be sentenced for up to 40 years for
something so dumb, besides the fact that she will likely never teach
again.  Mandatory sentencing in some cases may be equated to Zero
Tolerance policies that you may run into.  Either the judge has no
flexibility to be lenient or some wily prosecutor out to make a name for
himself goes for the max.  In any case, I'd assume that the judge, jury,
prosecution, defense are not fully educated on internet technology and
how these things can happen.


>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jim Herrmann
>Sent: Monday, January 15, 2007 11:33 PM

>
>Wouldn't even need Linux.  Firefox alone probably would have 
>prevented.  
>Wouldn't the IT guy who set up the firewall that didn't block 
>these sites be as liable as this woman.  It's definitely a 
>bullshit conviction.
>
>My $.02,
>Jim
>