Internet censorship in Oz?

[jetset]

INTERNET CENSORSHIP BY AUSSIES?

New Labour government makes a controversial move


Australia's recently seated new Labour federal government has wasted no time in introducing sensitive Internet legislation, proposing censorship laws aimed at stopping computer-savvy children from looking at banned sites, including online casinos and pornography.

Due to come into affect January 20, the new rules are designed to restrict access to age restricted content either hosted in or provided from Australia and apply to most service providers supplying content via a carriage service. Labour government spokesmen justified the new policy after claiming that the previous government’s proposal of supplying free NetNanny software to all households who wanted it wouldn’t adequately protect children.

The new rules require that Internet service providers supply ‘clean feeds’ excluding any age restricted content with users then able to ‘opt-out’ and not receive the censored feed.

Critics say that the legislation has serious implications for freedom of expression and would discourage parents from monitoring their children's Internet activities. There have also been accusations that the move is mere "political grandstanding."

"Anybody who's computer-savvy can work their way around these filters in about two minutes maximum," one pressure group claimed.

[Casinomeister]

Situations like this are always a laugh. The goverment has to step in to act as a net nanny. If I were an Aussie taxpayer, I'd be fuming.

What happened to responsible parental guidance and responsibility? Let's let the machines do the work

[AussieDave]

If I were an Aussie taxpayer, I'd be fuming.

Although I've know about this for a while, I really didn't think it would come into play considering the the last attempt at filtering Australian school Internet access. A 16 year old hacked the $84million program in under 30 min.

xxxhttp://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/Teen-cracks-AU-84-million-porn-filter-in-30-minutes/0,130061744,339281500,00.htm

I dare say that jetset is on the mark by referring to it as "political grandstanding". It would seem a direct kick in b#lls to the past Federal Government responsible for the above $84mil cock up.

This URL basically wraps it all up and why it's probably going to be hard to implement.

xxxhttp://mashable.com/2007/12/31/australia-censors-internet/

As a side note the New Government made a pledge to give a laptop computer to every secondary school child. So maybe these laptops will be fitted with some type of inbuilt filtering?

With the recent child porn ring bust here over the past few months, people are strongly pushing the question what the new Federal Government intends to do to combat the issue.

What happened to responsible parental guidance and responsibility?

My personal opinion aligns with yours CM. I know the worlds changed from when we were kids but most parents here allow their kids to run riot. Most kids here rule the parents and the house.

Oh btw yes I'm not happy with this filtering plan. It lends itself to being manipulated and people's freedom of choice and rights being invaded & or compromised.

On the bright side though, it will probably all fall apart at the seams.



Cheers

[jetset]

MORE FLAK FOR AUSSIES OVER INTERNET CONTROL

"Clean feed" concept of new Labour government could slow Internet access down

This week's news that the new Australian Labour government led by prime minister Kevin Rudd was planning to increase control and censorship of the Internet through ISPs has met with a less than enthusiastic reception from Australian IT experts.

Rudd's plan is to inspan Internet Service Providers by requiring them to provide "clean feeds" that are free of porn and online gambling sites - a move that has been politely described as "idealistic but impractical".

Supporters of the plan assure that only sites on a (presumably government authored) blacklist will be blocked, and that citizens can opt-out if they wish, but IT experts claim that the plan conflicts with Rudd's pre-election promises to speed up the Antipodean Internet.

"The Rudd Government campaigned on a platform promising to speed up Australians' access to the worlwide web by rolling out broadband around the country," commented Sue Dunlevy of Australian IT, pointing out that the blacklist enlistment of ISPs would have the opposite effect.

The "Clean Feed" plan would greatly strain and hinder Australia's internet performance, specialists opined.

[AussieDave]

All Aussie ISP's should give them the bird, because, if the ISP became the police on the Net (which is basically what they'd be) it would probably lend them to being liable should or if anything happens down the line.

Of course just my opinion.

I think there will be a public out cry over this, especially considering that most Australian's don't take too kindly to being told what to do.



Cheers

Trezz

[Mousey]

Tsk, tsk... we really wouldn't want a forward thinking country to censor the internet. Maybe they should just intimidate, coerce, and extort. They'd make millions for the Aussie gov't. that way.

The US Department of Justice has scored another victory in its war against online gambling, intimidating US giant Internet companies Microsoft, Google and Yahoo! into paying millions in fines and to desist from carrying online gambling advertising.