Schools across Kent began a comprehensive blocking of Sparklebox.co.uk, a popular school resource, in late 2009.
Last week the owner of Sparklebox was revealed to be a former teacher who faked his own death after serving a nine month jail sentence in 2005 for making indecent images of children. Daniel Kinge also changed his name to Samuel Kinge so he could re-offend and work with children again. Kinge later went on to form Sparklebox, a teachers resource website.
Sparklebox was originally blocked in late 2009 by councils. Concerns over the sites security were cited in an email to teachers explaining the block. Originally many teachers were confused and some angered over the block, as it was a site that many relied on for essential classroom resources. Kent County Council issued a statement confirming the block, "we feel it right to block the site centrally until more information is available and review whether this site should be blocked permanently after consulting schools and other sources."
According to the BBC (02:03:35), on Friday January 8, Samuel Kinge, 28, was sentenced to 12 months in prison. 424 indecent images of children were found in Kinge"s hard drive shadow files which included the depiction of the sexual abuse of babies. Yahoo Messenger had also been setup on his computer with the profile name of "samuelunder5boys" with the picture of a naked four year old attached. The court heard it was a legitimate business and there was no suggestion child porn was posted on Sparklebox. Kinge will serve at least half his sentence and when he is freed he will be ordered to sign the sex offenders register and an agreement which restricts his access to the internet for the next 15 years.