British watchdog backs down over Wikipedia image of nude girl

In the light of uproar over its decision to block a Wikipedia page about the German heavy metal ban the Scorpions because it included an image from the band's album "Virgin Killer," Britain's Internet Watch Foundation has decided to lift the ban.

Following representations from Wikipedia, IWF invoked its Appeals Procedure and has given careful consideration to the issues involved in this case. The procedure is now complete and has confirmed that the image in question is potentially in breach of the Protection of Children Act 1978. However, the IWF Board has today (9 December 2008) considered these findings and the contextual issues involved in this specific case and, in light of the length of time the image has existed and its wide availability, the decision has been taken to remove this webpage from our list.

The album was released in 1976 and the various versions of the image have appeared on album covers and repackaging.

The Wikimedia Foundation was delighted. General counsel Mike Godwin said in a release:

We recognize the good intentions of Internet watch groups, including their focus on blocking and discouraging illegal content. Nevertheless, this incident underscores the need for transparency and accountability in the processes of the Internet Watch Foundation and similar bodies around the world."

Added Godwin, "In the long run, monitoring groups need to develop a public set of 'best practices.' These best practices should, at a minimum, decrease the impact on content found to be lawful, acknowledge the context in which the content at issue occurs, and be maximally transparent both to service providers and to individual users. There should be no false or misleading error messages when online censorship does occur."