Thus exorcises its Demon: winning the net monitoring argument?

Thus, owner of Demon Internet, claimed to set a precedent on Monday by saying it will remove as much paedophilic material as it can from its newsgroups. What's this? Demon, once the most vocal campaigner against ISPs policing content, announcing it will monitor its servers?

Thus, and by implication Demon, are to take responsibility for content. It is a spectacular U-turn. Since the publication of an article in the Observer in August 1996, criticising Demon, the ISP has typically been quick to point out it cannot be held responsible for content.

In a press release published shortly after the Observer article ran, the company stated: "Demon is not the author of the content on the internet as it is only a provider of connectivity."

Its decision to go beyond this has created a wave of controversy.

Thus is not short of critics. One of the most well known is Dr Laurence Godfrey, science professor and long-term thorn in Thus' side since he successfully prosecuted the company for Demon failing to remove defamatory content from its servers. He has been lobbying the company for many years to monitor newsgroups for illegal content such as child pornography.

Godfrey questioned whether Demon has been wrong in arguing for the past six years against ISPs taking responsibility for content.

"It's the best example of a U-turn I have ever seen. But it's a pity it has taken them six to seven years to come to the realisation that this is obviously the right thing to do," he said.

There is no shortage of theories as to why this course of action has now been taken. One theory is that the company eventually considered its position untenable.

David Swarbrick, internet solicitor at Wrigley Claydon, said: "They finally found the argument unsustainable. Some of the board are genuinely intelligent and must have heard the emptiness of their own argument."

BT, Claranet, Freeserve and Virgin already remove paedophilia from newsgroups, even if this isn't widely publicised. But as Swarbrick points out, this doesn't necessarily solve the problem as paedophiles will always find somewhere else to post.

There has been little criticism of Thus for removing child porn. But it begs the questions, what took so long and why do it now?

Phil Payne, ex-Demon customer and computer specialist, told silicon.com: "This brings them more in line with the rest of the world. The general law and principles of society should apply to the internet. If it wants to be in 80 to 90 per cent of homes then it has to merge with society and align itself with its laws."

He claims pressing business and technology concerns instigated the about turn. Since the company took on a business rather than consumer focus 18 months ago its newsgroups have become a non-core service as they don't make money, he said.

In addition, by ridding itself of these newsgroups, the company frees up much needed bandwidth, lessening the rate at which it must upgrade its network.

"The news servers are over-busy, over-committed and under-configured. It is far cheaper to free up bandwidth and rewrite than upgrade," said Payne.

However, Richard Ashton, another ex-customer, claims Demon's decision to remove the newsgroups was motivated by publicity.

"This is just expedient publicity. The writing was on the wall, especially with the possibility of a government clamp down on paedophilia on the net. This is just a preemptive about turn. It is nothing but money-seeking publicity," he said.

This is a view shared by some silicon.com readers. One questioned whether Thus' decision was anything but a shameless PR stunt.

He wrote: "Thus should quit insulting the ethics of other ISPs with its conceited self-righteousness (assuming this is the cheap PR stunt it appears to be), stop attempting to capitalise on the existence of child porn for their own benefit, and work with other ISPs to help the industry devise a way to put an end to this filth."

Whether it is a shameless PR stunt or a business-motivated move, it brings the company in line with other ISPs on this topic. It also means those ISPs arguing against responsibility for content will now have a harder time justifying their actions. After all, one of the founding fathers of mass net usage has thrown down the gauntlet.