In an audio podcast interview for CBS News and CNET, ICM Registry CEO Stuart Lawley, the main behind the XXX domains, acknowledged that XXX domains, along with creative searching, will help seekers of adult content find what they’re looking for.  And to his company’s credit, he said that “for people wanting to look for adult content, they can go to XXX sites with a little bit more confidence that these sites are operating to standards and are being scanned by McAfee on a daily basis for malware.”

Lawley told me that all XXX must be free of illegal content, including child pornography and he said that “there is a restriction particularly in the registration of the domain name itself to keep away from anything that even suggests underage activity.” Depictions of sexual activity involving minors is illegal in the United States and most other countries but it is generally not against the law in the U.S. to use so called “barely legal” adult models who appear to be under 18.

Lawley was quick to point out that the XXX domains can also prevent kids and adults  from accidentally landing on porn sites.  For one thing, said Lawley, “Every single XXX site has the clear visual identifier of XXX so nobody’s going to type in that name by mistake … the adult nature of it is clearly signposted.”

It’s important for parents to know, however, that XXX is not mandatory. There is nothing to stop companies from continuing to use .com for adult sites and, indeed, it is likely that there will continue to be millions of pages of adult material that is not labeled XXX.

Labeling sites

In addition to the new TLD, ICM is working with MetaCert to label all XXX sites to make it easier for browsers and plug-ins to block them. Along with its XXX labels, MetaCert has cataloged and labeled more than 250 million sexually explicit web pages across all TLDs, including those ending in .com, according to Lawley.  Unlike most web filtering products, MetaCert labels pages via an open standard that can be supported by browsers and plug-ins. In a press release, MetaCert claims that its technology “is able to distinguish between a webpage containing sexually explicit adult content and a URL hosting important information about breast cancer, for example.” The company also said that the technology “works not only for sites listed in search results but also for those ‘linked to’ within websites – including from within social networking sites.”  Via email, MetaCert CEO Paul Walsh said that “.XXX pages currently makes up for .3% of our entire data set.”

MetaCert uses a crawling system to automatically label URLS with adult content. Unlike some filtering systems, it works on a page by page basis rather than an entire domain.

MetaCert offers a free plug-in for Firefox that parents can install to block kids from accessing adult content or companies can use to “know if a link is safe to open at work.”  Lawley said that technology to block XXX domains as well as sites labeled by MetaCert will be built into future versions of the major browsers.

It will be interesting to see if MetaCert succeeds is keeping kids away from porn but — after watching scores of companies and non-profits tackle this issue for the past 20 years, I’m a bit skeptical.  But even if the technology were 100% perfect, it would still not be a replacement for parental involvement. Besides, a filtering system is a temporary solution and is not appropriate for all kids. At the end of the day, the best filter is the one that runs between the child’s ears. Not only will it protect them from inappropriate sites, it will protect them from exercising  bad judgment thought their life, including in such areas a dangerous driving or unsafe sex where the stakes can be a lot higher.

You can get lots of information on keeping kids safe, secure and productive online from my site SafeKids.com and at ConnectSafely.org, a non-profit Internet safety organization where I serve as co-director.