Scunthorpe Problem

The Scunthorpe Problem occurs when a spam filter or search engine blocks e-mails or search results because their text contains a string of letters that are shared by an obscene word. While computers can easily identify strings of text within a document, broad blocking rules will result in a false positive, causing innocent phrases to be blocked.

Origin and history

The problem was named after an incident in 1996 in which America Online's dirty-word filter prevented residents from the town of Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire, England from creating accounts with AOL, because the town's name contains the substring "cunt". Years later, Google's filters apparently made the same mistake, preventing residents from searching for local businesses that included "Scunthorpe" in their names. Residents of Penistone, South Yorkshire, experienced problems because the town's name includes the substring "penis", while Lightwater in Surrey suffered similarly because its name contains the substring "twat". Gareth Roelofse, the designer of the website RomansInSussex.co.uk, noted: "We found many library Net stations, school networks and Internet cafes block sites with the word 'sex' in" the domain name. This was a challenge for RomansInSussex.co.uk because its target audience is school children." [http://news.com.com/2100-1032_3-5198125.html CNET article on the Scunthorpe Problem.]

Problems can also occur with the words "socialism" or "socialist" because they contain the substring "Cialis", the brand name for an erectile dysfunction medication commonly advertised in spam e-mails. A similar problem can occur with the word "specialist", typically blocking mailed résumés and other material including job descriptions. [http://www.pekingduck.org/archives/002371.php Example of a website that blocks the substring Cialis.]

Other examples

Mistaken decisions by obscenity filters include:

* In April 1998 Jeff Gold attempted to register the domain name shitakemushrooms.com, but was blocked by a InterNIC filter prohibiting the "seven dirty words" which was active between 1996 and the transfer of control to ICANN.cite web
url=http://www.news.com/2100-1023-210566.html
title=Food domain found "obscene"
publisher=News.com
date=April 27, 1998
author=Paul Festa]

* In October 2004, it was reported that the Horniman Museum in London was failing to receive some of its e-mail due to filters mistakenly deciding that its name was a version of the words "horny man". [ [http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/lewgreennews/display.var.533121.0.name_of_museum_is_confused_with_porn.php Name Of Museum Is Confused With Porn (from News Shopper) ] ] [ [http://www.horniman.ac.uk/ Horniman Museum ] ]

* In February 2004, Craig Cockburn of Scotland reported that he was unable to use his surname (pronounced "Coburn") with Hotmail, Yahoo! or his workplace computers. He discovered that his e-mails would be delivered if he spelled his name C0ckburn (with a zero instead of the letter "o"). [ [http://www.smh.com.au/cgi-bin/common/popupPrintArticle.pl?path=/articles/2004/02/26/1077676867921.html Print Article: How Mr C0ckburn fought spam ] ]

* Web searches on the Nigerian-born footballer Nwankwo Kanu may be blocked due the substring "wank" in his name.

* In February 2006 Linda Callahan, a resident of Ashfield, Massachusetts was initially prevented from registering her name with Yahoo! as an e-mail address as it contained the substring "Allah". Yahoo! later reversed the ban. [ [http://quickwired.com/kallahar/stories/2005-Yahoo/yahoo.php Kallahar's Place: Is Yahoo Banning Allah? ] ]

* The town of Whakatane in New Zealand was blocked by its own spam filter, because the "Wh" is pronounced approximately as "F". [cite web|url=http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,24112585-5014108,00.html|title=F-word town censors itself on the internet|accessdate=2008-08-01]

* In July 2008, Dr. Herman I. Libshitz was initially unable to get the e-mail address he wanted from Verizon because of a word contained within his name. A spokesperson commented: "As a general rule (since 2005) Verizon doesn't allow questionable language in e-mail addresses, but we can, and do, make exceptions based on reasonable requests. The one from Dr. and Mrs. Libshitz certainly is reasonable and we regret the inconvenience and frustration they've been caused." [cite web|url=http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/26089374.html|title=When your name gets turned against you|accessdate=2008-08-03]

Additionally there can be cases of whole word filtering, showing that computer obscenity filters may fail to take into account the context in which a word appears:

* In May 2006 Ray Kennedy from Manchester in the UK found that e-mails that he had written to his local council to complain about a planning application had been blocked as they contained the word "erection" when referring to a structure. [BBC [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/manchester/5031156.stm E-mail filter blocks 'erection'] 30 May 2006]

* In October 2004, e-mails advertising the pantomime Dick Whittington sent by a teacher from Norwich in the UK were blocked by school computers due to the use of the word "Dick". [Sam Jones [http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1326590,00.html Panto email falls foul of filth filter] "The Guardian" 14 October 2004]

* In February 2003 Members of Parliament at the British House of Commons found that a new spam filter was blocking e-mails containing references to the Sexual Offences Bill then under debate, as well as some messages relating to a discussion about censorship. [BBC [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/2723851.stm E-mail vetting blocks MPs' sex debate] 4 February 2003]

* Résumés of "magna cum laude" graduates have been blocked by spam filters due to inclusion of the word "cum". [cite web |url=http://www.collegejournal.com/jobhunting/resumeadvice/20040426-maher.html |title=Don't Let Spam Filters Snatch Your Resume |accessdate=2008-02-11 |work=Career Journal |last=Maher |first=Kris ]

See also

*Censorship by Google
*Medireview
*Regular expression examples
*Swear filter
* [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Spam_blacklist Spam blacklist: a list of words and domain names blocked by regex rules at Wikimedia]

References