News

Porn viewing persists at New York City Wi-Fi kiosks

September 14, 2016

New York City residents continue to report porn viewing at outdoor Wi-Fi kiosks. A woman in Murray Hill recently said that she found a homeless man  pleasuring himself next to a kiosk, and the community is starting to take action against porn viewers, according to a report by Pix 11.

The Wi-Fi kiosks by LinkNYC were intended to provide free Wi-Fi, information and advertisements. Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. is calling for the city to install filters on the kiosks and limit the amount of time an individual can spend on the service.

"After learning about the inappropriate and over-extended usage of LinkNYC kiosks throughout the city, in particular in Manhattan, it is time to make adjustments that will allow all of our city residents to use this service safely and comfortably," Diaz said in the report. "There should be a way where you can register like you do with Wi-Fi with an email address and have that timed out and then you can't log on for 'x' amount of time."

Diaz also said it would be simple to block a large number porn sites by installing filters.

LinkNYC is aware of the issues and said it is, "currently working on changes to LinkNYC tablets in response to their concerns to prevent Links from being monopolized by any individual or groups of users."