Industrial tribunal gets down and dirty

Arbitrators suffer emotional turmoil over porn emails

By Kieren McCarthy • Get more from this author

Posted in Music and Media, 21st September 2000 12:25 GMT

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An Australian tribunal over the sacking of two Toyota employees for Net porn has included a blue movie and dodgy pics as evidence.

When the two men were sacked, union members left the shopfloor in protest. At the tribunal, however, the presiding head ruled that those deciding the men's fate should see the porn in question. The room was closed to the public and arbitrators were asked to view the filthy stuff on laptops.

A female employee of Toyota said in the company's defence that she felt physically ill after seeing some of the emails. The union officer on the other hand said the car company had been harsh and unreasonable in sacking the employees straight off.

The situation could have been avoided however if the company had used a new piece of anti-porn software that has been getting a lot of press in the last two days. Content Technologies' Pornsweeper analyses the pics attached to both incoming and outgoing email. It looks for human characteristics such as eyes to identify pictures of humans and then checks out the amount of skin on offer by analysing colours. A clever solution, no doubt, which may require pornographers to become a little more creative in their composition. ®