"In a comically inept move..." BT Total Censorship and the Streisand Effect

BT's major PR blunder of deleting all reference to the vile Phorm/Webwise system from its broadband support fora continues to whizz through the internet as the Streisand effect builds.

The Register weighs in - "BT silences customers over Phorm":

Adam Liversage, BT's chief press officer, told The Register: "The reason why we've done this is that the point of the forums is technical support and the WebWise threads weren't appropriate."

He said the fact that BT had chosen not only to close the threads but delete them entirely was insignificant. "It doesn't matter either way because the people who are following this will have the threads backed up in multiple copies," he said.

thinkbroadband - "BT bans discussion of Phorm on its BT Beta forums":

Whether this will turn into an own goal, depends a lot on what BT Retail does next. In the current economic climate the pressures to gain extra income from systems like Phorm will be increasing, but there will be a point at which the silent majority decide that some processes are too much of an invasion of privacy and rebel. 

EU commissioner is probably aware

PCPro -"BT bans Phorm chatter on its forums":

BT's taken the rather draconian step of banning discussion about Webwise on its support site. 

MediaPost report -"Hear No Evil: ISP Deletes Consumer Complaints In Forum":

When customers have so many concerns that they're moved to complain in writing, could BT really think that purging those comments is an effective response?  

Techwatch -  "BT bans Phorm discussion":

It seems that BT is asking for trouble as it has banned any discussion about the Phorm, or as they call it Webwise, issue on any of its customer forums.

Not only that, all threads that relate to the targeted advertising system have been deleted going to back to February of this year.

ZDnet -  "BT deletes Phorm forums"