VATICAN CITY
National Catholic Reporter
by Joshua J. McElwee | Mar. 8, 2013
Rome —
One of the domain names of a website that is the primary source of information on clergy sex abuse cases has been blocked on the Vatican’s web servers.
Users on Vatican servers who try to access one of the four web addresses for Bishopaccountability.org, which tracks publicly available information on clergy accused of abuse, are told the page has been blocked because of “Hate/Racism.”
A Vatican spokesman said the site may be blocked because of an automatic filter system that checks words that appear on websites for explicit nature or inappropriateness.
Some court documents that appear on the site might contain such language, said Basilian Fr. Thomas Rosica. “It would make sense they would block the words, not knowing it’s a clergy abuse website.”
When accessing one of the four web addresses for Bishopaccountability.org, users are told “this page has been blocked by the Vatican protection system” in Italian capital letters in a notice at the top of a page with a background image of St. Peter’s Basilica.
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