Chris Barton: It's like trying to hold back the tide

COMMENT

Shut up. Don't speak. Shush. "Free unmoderated chat isn't safe." Only a computer company executive could make such an absurd statement.

I always thought free unmoderated chat - something I tend to engage in every day - was a basic human right.

Even if it is of the online kind - talk that occurs not by moving your lips, but by a flourish of fingers on a keyboard, usually with frightful spelling and awful abbreviations.

Microsoft reckons chat of this ilk is terribly unsafe - so much so that it's shutting down its web-based chat services worldwide. Why? Because they are a magnet for paedophiles and pornographic spammers and Microsoft wants to show "a responsible leadership position".

Yes, bad things can happen in chatrooms, but no more so than anywhere else on the net or in the real world.

If Microsoft was really serious about its chat ban, it would shut down MSN Messenger, which has 100 million users worldwide.

As I watch my 12-year-old daughter merrily chatting away on this service to her school friends - often while surfing the net and talking on the phone at the same time - I fret a lot more about some nefarious creep invading that closed circle than I do about the web-based chat she never bothers with.

Ditto for the mountain of pornographic spam email that finds its way into Microsoft's Hotmail service. Should that be shut down too?

Of course it shouldn't because email and online chat are darned useful communication tools - although it would be nice if we could automatically filter out the rubbish so our kids aren't exposed it.

As with everything to do with parenting, none of it is that easy. So I constantly annoy my daughter by asking just who are the bizarre online aliases in her contact list.

"Yes, yes, they're all people I know. Everyone else gets blocked," she says. "Yes I know, don't open attachments and delete the spam." At which time I retreat - trusting that some of the online safety lessons have got through.

As for Microsoft's chat shutdown, it is either a move to save money or to make sure it is not exposed to lawsuits. As an unmoderated conduit for defamation, harassment and objectionable material, it is possible in some jurisdictions Microsoft could be liable for damages claims.

Either way, in the face of the vast number of other chatrooms on the net, Microsoft's stance seems as ineffectual as that of King Canute.

* Email Chris Barton