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Hasidic firms look forward to safe surfing

The only computer with a portal to depravity in Joseph and Judy
Greenfeld's tile store is upstairs in their office, where it's off
limits to their 50 employees.
The Greenfelds, who live in the Hasidic community of Kiryas Joel
and own All sTiles on Route 17M in Blooming Grove, constantly use the
Internet to run their bustling tile store: to check their bank
accounts online, to find tiles they don't stock that a customer has
requested, to e-mail the BlackBerry of an elusive salesman.
But the mere presence of the Internet causes jitters in their home
community, where rabbis denounce it over and over as a corrupting
influence, especially on young people. Even though their workers
can't go online, the Greenfelds say, some parents don't want their
daughters working in the store.
They hope that will change soon, when All sTiles and other Hasidic-
owned businesses in Orange County get access for the first time to
TheJnet, an Internet service marketed to Orthodox Jews that tries to
balance modern business and communication needs with strict modesty
standards.
The problem with the Internet in general isn't just pornography
sites. It's also the chat rooms where predators lurk and
conversations get racy; the photos of Britney Spears gyrating and
locking lips with Madonna; stories about Michael Jackson cavorting
with youngsters and bottles of "Jesus Juice"; Web sites with who-
knows-what.
For a culture that doesn't go to the movies or watch television,
that separates the sexes and steers clear of non-Jewish books and
newspapers, all this Internet stuff is very, very ugly.
The Hasidim want to shelter their kids from the outside world, not
hand them the keys. Even adults don't want to tempt themselves:
Kiryas Joel Administrator Gedalye Szegedin, for one, has never surfed
the Net.
And yet, doing your job without it gets harder and harder.
Enter TheJnet.
The Brooklyn-based company was created less than three years ago
and has more than 10,000 customers, mostly in New York and New
Jersey, says Zelig Rosenthal, TheJnet's president.
Users can request service that only lets them visit selected
sites. But most opt for wider Internet access, with only
objectionable materials blocked. They choose one of five screening
levels, starting with porn and adding a succession of other risky
areas: chat rooms, ads, entertainment, shopping and humor sites and
magazines.
Internet users can already buy filtering software for as little as
$30 and install it on their computers to block such materials. But
any computer-savvy kid or employee cruising for porn can outsmart
those programs, claims Rosenthal. He boasts his "server-based" censor
is better because you can't bypass it.
"As long as software is installed on my computer, I can take it
out," he explains. "And as long as I can take it out, it's not safe."
Besides, his service comes with rabbinical approval. A board of
Orthodox rabbis advises TheJnet and "60 percent of the leading
rabbis" have endorsed it, Rosenthal says.
But there is no such thing yet as kosher Internet service, and
Rosenthal concedes his company might not meet such a demanding
standard.
"Ninety-nine percent kosher," he said, "is still not kosher."
Running TheJnet service to Kiryas Joel from Brooklyn required
cooperation from the local phone company, Frontier, a Citizens
Communications Co. But Rosenthal says Frontier officials resisted
when he first approached them a year ago.
At their request, he submitted a petition, which he says more than
250 local businesses signed. Szegedin says business owners asked him
to intercede in the talks in October after TheJnet – already
available to large Hasidic populations in Brooklyn and Rockland
County – ran an advertising blitz in the Yiddish newspapers.
Szegedin says he met with both sides and told Frontier that having
TheJnet was vital to the village. After further discussion, the two
companies signed an agreement March 9 making TheJnet available to
Kiryas Joel residents and business owners from the community.
Vincent Barrett, a Frontier regional sales manager in Middletown,
says in response that the company never resisted cooperating with
TheJnet but had to know first how much demand for the service existed.
Frontier had to install additional equipment in a switching
station in Kiryas Joel to enable TheJnet service, Barrett says. The
system has been tested and is ready to go; the first customers will
likely be connected tomorrow, Rosenthal says.
TheJnet probably won't spark an immediate cyber-revolution in
Kiryas Joel, whose residents belong to perhaps the most conservative
branch of Hasidic Jews. Most homes in the community of 17,000 Satmar
Hasidim don't have computers, much less the Internet. Parents are so
leery of computers and the Internet that the girls schools dropped
computer classes in September.
"We were afraid we were going to teach the kids to be addicted to
the computers," says Rabbi Ely Shloma Kohn, principal of the girls
schools.
One indication of the disapproval attached to the Internet is that
when a Web site was launched last year to promote Kiryas Joel,
Szegedin insisted the village government had nothing to do with it.
Another is that TheJnet is running local ads saying the service
should be used in businesses, not homes.
Businesses in Kiryas Joel that need the Internet already have it.
"My whole business is the Internet," says Joel Deutsch, who
operates a one-man travel agency out of the basement of a condominium
building off Forest Road.
"I don't think today you can stay in business without it," says
Karl Weinstock, owner of the Golden Palace jewelry store in Kiryas
Joel's shopping strip.
Many of these businesses use filtering software and take other
precautions, such as limiting who uses the computer. Weinstock lets
all his employees go online, but keeps the computer in the open so
everyone can see the screen. In Village Hall, a list is printed each
month showing what sites were visited on the only computer with
Internet access.
What TheJnet will offer Weinstock and other business owners is
peace of mind. Szegedin, who plans to get the Internet on his work
computer for the first time, also views TheJnet as an economic
development tool, hoping it will attract new businesses to Kiryas
Joel.
The Greenfelds, meanwhile, hope it will make it easier for them to
hire young women.
"A father would be more comfortable," Joseph says.
"He would be reassured that his daughter would not be able to fly
around the world," his wife adds.