TRA clarifies Flickr blocking

The website Flickr.com breaches the "prohibited content" category of the UAE Telecommunications Regulatory Authority's Internet Access Management (IAM) policy regarding sexual nudity, the regulator said yesterday in a statement.

Due to "technical difficulties", telecoms operator du was not able to block the site until last week, it said. "Flickr.com as a site does not have the technical facility of blocking prohibited contents, and it cannot be partially blocked; such facility is available on YouTube, Facebook and other similar sites," the TRA statement said.

Since the Internet Access Management policy was issued, around 1,000 blocked websites have been unblocked, TRA said.

Flickr.com was not one of them. Of these, 73 per cent were blocked due to pornography and nudity content, the regulator said.

The TRA has requested internet service providers to publish the "prohibited content" categories and build a customer-feedback mechanism to receive comments on content they think it should or should not be blocked, the statement said.

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