Calgary police honoured for Web work

[Tami]

Calgary police honoured for Web work

Canadian Press Article

CALGARY — The Calgary police service has been honoured for its on-line crime-fighting crusades by the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre For Holocaust Studies, a Canadian human-rights organization dedicated to tolerance.

Centre director Leo Adler said the Internet has become a cheap, far-reaching and seductive way of spreading hate and terrorism.

"Sadly, 60 years after the Second World War — the war against hate and anti-Semitism — came to an end, the battle is still continuing," said Mr. Adler, whose Toronto-based organization has launched its educational CD entitled Digital Terrorism and Hate 2005.

"The Internet's become a key strategic asset for terrorists, supremacists and skinheads — it's the most powerful marketing tool ever created, and it's become a weapon of choice."

Officials fighting the spread say they are busy now with 5,000 hate and terrorism websites.

Policing the Internet is restricted by jurisdictional problems and a lack of training and resources, said Const. Kathy Macdonald of the Calgary police crime prevention unit.

"It's shocking to think there are hate and terrorist sites out there available very easily for our kids to land on," said Const. Macdonald. "It becomes an awareness factor — educating parents that these malicious and deceptive sites exist and explaining how they and their kids can avoid them."

Const. Macdonald, whose unit works closely with RCMP and other law-enforcement agencies worldwide, advises parents to pay attention to children's Internet practices and encourage them to ask questions about any suspect sites.

But many are attractive to kids because of their use of games, puzzles and cartoons in dispersing messages.

Of Canadian sites spreading hate and terrorism, most target immigration policies.

Mr. Adler and Tom Keenan, an Internet expert with the University of Calgary, praised Canadian providers for policing against such websites.

Shaw Cable shut down seven terrorists sites originating in The Netherlands a mere 24 hours after being tipped off by Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre.

"I worry about these rogue Internet providers — some in Europe and the U.S. — that really have no standards or ethics, and they'll host any site," Keenan said. "So the bad news is that someone who wants a website can register anywhere in the world, and it makes it difficult for the police to track them down and do anything about it."

[url=\"http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050517.gtcalgary0517/BNStory/Technology/\"][u]source: Globe & Mail[/u][/url]