[anti-abuse-wg] False positive CSAM blocking attributed to RIPE

Dear all,

I am new to this list, although I am not completely new to the Internet
technical community, as I am a long-time IGF (and occasionally ICANN)
participant.

I am writing about a case that has been referred to my organization
involving global blocking (packet dropping, apparently) of IP addresses
that have been reported as hosting CSAM by the Canadian Center for Child
Protection (C3P). According to public information, the C3P runs a web
crawler called Project Arachnid which searches for instances of CSAM on the
clearweb, and sends automated takedown notices to providers.

However, in the case that was reported to me, rather than allowing the
hosting provider to take down the offending image, the takedown notice was
followed by global packet dropping of the hosting IP address, which took
down the entire server and other websites along with it: the hosting
provider has attributed this censorship to RIPE, although I cannot verify
whether or not this is true. If I am able to obtain more details from RIPE
staff, I will follow up with them.

Moreover the website in question was not a CSAM website, and neither was
the image reported by the C3P a CSAM image. It was a scan of a 1960s
postcard of an indigenous family, sent through the mail, which was included
in a detailed ethnographic blog article about indigenous women and girls.
In other words, this is an obvious false positive, and it should never have
been reported as CSAM at all.

I'm writing to find out if anyone has more information that they can share
about how this might have happened, and how it can be prevented from
happening in the future. Many thanks in advance for any help that you can
offer. Not sure if I should include the RIPE Cooperation ML on this, given
that it relates to the actions of the C3P?

-- 
Jeremy Malcolm PhD LLB (Hons) B Com
Executive Director, Prostasia Foundation
https://prostasia.org - +1 415 650 2557
ᐧ
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