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@Velocio
Their statements are in fact false. The "opt-in" is default opted-in. BT were the first to go public with this only 5 days ago: http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/2013/12/16/bt-opt-out/1 and tech reporters are rightly calling this as being "opt-out" not "opt-in". The defaults matter when it's been proven that few people change them.
So the default "opt-in" is blocked, which means the default is blocked.
There is 1984-style double-speak in almost all communication about the net filters from the companies involved and the government and politicians.
And then only a matter of weeks ago it was revealed in the Hansard record (House of Commons logs) that Cameron was boasting how the filters will be used by the government to block all "extremist" web-sites as they've put in place the means to block such sites (these filters):
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmhansrd/cm131023/debtext/131023-0001.htm#13102348000373
This is a reverse on his own statements 6 months ago in which he assured the public that the filters would be independent (private companies) and that they were for child safety only.
Already demonstrating that the filters have an encroaching, subjective, censoring effect.
The initial tests against O2's URL checker shows that anything in which people generate their own content is basically blocked. This is nothing to do with child safety, or even terrorism... these are just sweeping censorship controls and by having pressured ISPs to adopt them the government is able to exert control over the censorship without having to have gone through any accountable process (like the law courts) to have specific web sites or content blocked.
The liability for those private companies (BT, TalkTalk, Sky, etc) will be such that there will be no downside to blocking first and waiting for the websites to appeal and fight to be unblocked.
It is censorship, there can be no other word for it. It's not even a stretch to call it undemocratic when it's user-generated content (people talking publicly) that is being so targeted.