A Shipley software company is fighting pornography on the Internet - by measuring the amount of flesh on screen.

Software company Eye-t Technology has sold thousands of copies of its web filter in a bid to eliminate cyberspace porn.

Most Internet filters on the market ban websites on name alone. But Eyeguard works by detecting skin tone to recognise images of naked flesh and automatically shuts down the PC.

Alternatively, the package can monitor students or employees accessing pornography or flash up warnings to the user.

The software would have detected the Odsal Times Internet newspaper which the Telegraph & Argus revealed had been overrun by soft porn.

Community leaders were shocked to discover its innocent website had been linked to a site showing photos of naked women.

John Brannan, managing director of the company which now has branches in the USA and Australia, said more and more web pages were being hijacked by pornographic sites which were running out of names to register.

"It's rife and it isn't going to stop now," he said. "Pornography is here to stay.

"People are going to totally innocuous sites and coming across these images. Unless they really know what they're doing, it's like a maze and it's happening all the time."

He added that Internet searches on girls' names were most likely to bring up adult sites and that he had heard of one search on boy band Boyzone which had led to a gay hard porn site.

The company has been flooded with inquiries about the filter, particularly from the USA and the Middle East where Muslims are keen to use the technology.

"It might pick up family pictures, for example a baby lying on a blanket, but it's 98 per cent effective and totally guaranteed to catch people looking at porn," said Mr Brannan.

PC Paul Bayer, of Woodside Police, today said the Odsal Times website was being dealt with by Internet service provider Globalnet.

Globalnet said it was investigating the site.

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