PICS Scenarios

Outline

1. Mission
2. Solution outline
3. Scenario 1: parent subscribes to a third-party labeling service.
   Scenario 1a: filtering at browser.
   Scenario 1b: filtering at Proxy server run by on-line provider.
   
4. Scenario 2: teachers collaborate on lesson-specific boundaries.

Mission

The three primary goals are to:

• enable content providers to voluntarily label the content they create and distribute.
• enable third-party labeling services to associate additional labels with content created and distributed by others. Services may devise their own labeling systems, and the same content may receive conflicting labels from different services.
• enable parents and teachers to use the labels to control the information that children under their supervision receive.

Solution outline

Almost everything available on the Internet has a name (e.g., a URL). A content provider or third-party service can associate a label (e.g, a rating) with the name of an item. More generally, labels can be associated with collections of items. For example, an entire site can be labeled by associating a label with the site's name.

The technical working group will define a format for a label, indicating required and optional fields. The format will not specify which words or categories will be used for labeling or the criteria for assigning labels to items.

We will define at least three label distribution methods:

• along with a document or other item (probably in the document header).
• through a label server that is available on a computer network.
• in files that are distributed, perhaps over a computer network or perhaps by CD-ROM.

Our agreements will address the issues of label authenticity and the contents of items changing over time without their names changing. Our solutions, however, may not be 100% foolproof on these dimensions. Where possible, we will rely on existing technologies and standards.

Our agreements will not specify who can provide labels. In particular, a content provider may self-label its material, and third parties may also label the same material.

The resulting infrastructure will allow content providers, independent third party labelers, and parents, to make choices which reflect their own values. The infrastructure developed by the technical group, however, will only facilite these choices, not make any content-based choices itself.

We will provide some advice to implementors of software that interacts with the labeling infrastructure on ways to use the labels, but that advice need not be followed. In particular, we will not specify the user interface of Internet browsers, though we may suggest desirable functions to include.

Scenario 1:

Parent subscribes to a third-party labeling service

A parent (for the sake of concreteness, we will assume the mother) would like her son, age 10, and daughter, age 14, to explore the wealth of information that is available through the Internet. She is concerned, however, that the children may retrieve text or images or participate in interactive chat sessions that they are not mature enough to handle.

• The parent installs labeling-compliant browser software on the home computer.
• Using the computer, the parent reads about several labeling services. Some services charge a fee for their use, while others are free. Each service describes its labeling system and illustrates it with examples. For example, some services rate only on the presence of nudity and have very concrete criteria, while others take into account multiple factors. Some services rely on computer analysis of text and images to assign labels, while other services employ people to assign the labels.
• The parent finds that a service called GoodCleanFun is most compatible with her values. GoodCleanFun employs people to label items by the minimum age of children that should, according to its values, be exposed to the items.
• The parent configures the browser so that it checks with the labeling service before downloading text or pictures, or connecting to chat channels. She configures it so that her 10 year old son can access only information that GoodCleanFun marks as appropriate to his age group. She believes that her 14 year old daughter is mature for her age and can safely be exposed to materials labeled for 16 year olds; the parent configures the browser software accordingly.
• GoodCleanFun attempts to label everything available on the Internet, but inevitably misses some things. The parent configures the browser to block the younger child's access to items that GoodCleanFun has not labeled. For the 14 year old, she configures the browser to consult the publisher's own labels. The parent is not thrilled with the rating criteria used by most publishers to label their own content, and she knows that some publishers deliberately mislabel things. Still, for those items that GoodCleanFun has not labeled, she decides that the publisher's labels are an acceptable backup.
• Either child may use the computer without the parent present, but the browser software always checks GoodCleanFun's labels and enforces the rules that the parent has set. The browser may either retrieve the labels from GoodCleanFun over the Internet, or read them from a CD-ROM.
• The browser may indicate to the child which links are available, perhaps with a color coding scheme. If the child attempts to retrieve something that is blocked, the browser offers an explanation of why the item is blocked. At the child's urging, a parent can enter a password to temporarily override the block.

This scenario provides parents and children with the same look and feel as the one above, but the underlying technology differs slightly.

• The parent purchases Internet access through an on-line provider. Rather than providing unrestricted access, the provider offers access through a proxy server.
• The parent specifies access rules for her children exactly as in the scenario above. Here, however, the proxy server rather than the browser enforces the rules.
• In this scenario, children can not bypass the parent-specified access rules simply by loading software for a different browser onto the home computer. Once the parent has conveyed rules to the proxy server, the on-line service can enforce them even if the software on the home computer changes.

Notes on Scenario 1

• A key element of this scenario is that it must be easy for the parent to configure the browser. The user interface for doing so will not be specified by this group, but will instead be a point of competition among providers of on-line services, Internet browsers, and browser accessories.
• Vendors will also compete based on how difficult they make it for children to bypass rules that parents set. Passwords or other authentication schemes will prevent children from reconfiguring rules. In the implementation of scenario 1b, loading a new browser does not disable the rules; future operating systems may prevent children from loading new browsers at all. Even the best implementation, however, will not provide complete security. In particular, children will be able to bypass their parents' rules by using computers at the homes of friends who have more permissive parents.

Scenario 2:

Teachers collaborate on lesson-specific boundaries.

The social studies teachers in a Middle School plan to use the Internet as part of a series of lessons on how the U.S. government operates. The teachers would like to conduct supervised sessions where students explore the materials prepared by Federal agencies and political interest groups. The teachers are concerned, however, that the students may wander off the intended topic. Some materials, such as comic strips, may be acceptable for students to look at during free time, but not during the social studies lessons.

• Prior to the lessons, the teachers identify a number of sites, documents, and chat rooms that they believe are relevant to the topic. Using an Internet browser or a special-purpose software package, the teachers create labels for those sites, documents and chat rooms.
• The teachers create access rules in much the same way as the parent in the scenario above. The difference here is that the teachers' rules rely on their own labels, rather than a third party's labels.
• During the social studies lessons, students are able to access only those documents and sites pre-approved by the teachers. During free times, the teachers may configure a different set of rules that permits access to a wider range of materials. As in the first scenario, the enforcment of rules may happen either on each individual computer or at a proxy server.