Oz to filter criminal content

The Australian government is forging ahead with nationwide filtering "despite widespread criticism that it will strangle free speech and is doomed to fail," reports Agence France Press reports. However, it looks as if all that will be blocked is "Web sites containing criminal content" or child pornography, according to the BBC, the kind of filtering that has been in place in the UK for some time. "Blacklisted sites would be determined by an independent classification body via a 'public complaint' process," Australia's communications minister, Stephen Conroy. [I last posted about filtering in Oz in July.]

Ed campaign on sexting in Oz

Not at all surprising (because what are borders or continents, where social technology's concerned), the New South Wales government is educating its teens about the risks of sexting too. "The government has produced a fact sheet for schools, parents and young people to warn about the possible lifetime consequences of the growing practice," the Sydney Morning Herald reports. The NSW minister of community services told the Morning Herald that her department "had received reports of girls as young as 13 sending sexually explicit images to their boyfriends' mobiles, which are then passed on to other friends." Like in the US, youth are being warned that the practice is illegal. Interestingly, there's nothing in either the article or the Community Services Department's Fact Sheet on Sexting about the risk to children of being convicted for producing, possessing, or distributing child pornography, as can happen in the US (though there are efforts in some US states to take criminal prosecution off the table). The NSW Fact Sheet refers to the risks of "public humiliation, cyberbullying, or even sexual assault." For US-style info on sexting, check out our tips at ConnectSafely.org. Meanwhile, the Australian federal government has appointed a Youth Advisory Group of 305 11-to-17-year-olds to "advise the Government on strategies to tackle online bullying," NEWS.com.au reports.

Oz to scrap mandatory filtering

Public opposition to the Australian government's plan to mandate Internet filtering has been growing, but this week the plan "has effectively been scuttled," the Sydney Morning Herald reports. after a senator withdrew support for the scheme. "The Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, has consistently ignored advice from a host of technical experts saying the filters would slow the internet, block legitimate sites, be easily bypassed and fall short of capturing all of the nasty content available online." Among those opposed to his plan were consumers, lobby groups, ISPs, corporate IT people, Save the Children, the political opposition, and "even the conservative Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, who famously tried to censor the chef Gordon Ramsay's swearing on television." A national survey unveiled this week found that "only 5% of Australians want ISPs to be responsible for protecting children online and only 4% want Government to have this responsibility," the Morning Herald added. [For background, see "Oz filtering update," January 2.]

Oz filtering update

The protests are getting louder and their base is broadening, but so far the Australian government's nationwide filter plan is going forward. "Consumers, civil-rights activists, engineers, Internet providers and politicians from opposition parties are among the critics of a mandatory Internet filter that would block at least 1,300 Web sites prohibited by the government - mostly child pornography, excessive violence, instructions in crime or drug use and advocacy of terrorism," Yahoo News reports. Dubbed by critics as "the "Great Aussie Firewall," the Internet service provider-based filtering "promises to make Australia one of the strictest Internet regulators among democratic countries.... It would be "less severe than controls in Egypt and Iran, where bloggers have been imprisoned; in North Korea, where there is virtually no Internet access; or in China, which has a pervasive filtering system.... Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom have filters, but they are voluntary." The filtering is scheduled to be tested through next June and has yet to be approved by Parliament. One of the world's largest children's nonprofit organizations, Save the Children, questioned the allocation of funds earlier this month (see my item on this), but proponents question those who "believe freedom of speech is more important than limiting what children can access online," Yahoo reports. Part of people's concern, reports indicate, is about using a technology that's both flawed and significantly slows down connection speeds. "A laboratory test of six filters for the Australian Communications Media Authority found they missed 3-12% of material they should have barred and wrongly blocked access to 1-8% of Web sites. The most accurate filters slowed browsing speeds up to 86%."

Oz child advocates oppose filtering

US educators frustrated with school filters will be interested in this news from Oz: "Support for the Government's plan to censor the Internet has hit rock bottom, with even some children's welfare groups now saying that that the mandatory filters, aimed squarely at protecting kids, are ineffective and a waste of money," The Age reports. The plan - "to block 'illegal' content for all Australian internet users and 'inappropriate' adult content on an opt-in basis" - has also received "harsh opposition" from Australian consumers, online rights groups, the Greens, the Opposition, and the Internet industry. The Age cites the view of Holly Doel-Mackaway of Save the Children, "the largest independent children's rights agency in the world," that educating kids and parents is "the way to empower young people to be safe internet users." Filtering's flawed, she told the paper, because it doesn't get to the problem at its source and can't help but block useful online resources. "Live trials" of the filtering are scheduled to start by the holidays, The Age adds.

All Oz to have filtering

Soon all Australians' Internet access will be filtered, "under the government's $125.8 [about $85 million US] million Plan for Cyber-Safety," TechWorld Australia reports. The Australian government is requiring all Internet service providers to provide "a clean feed" to households, schools and public places with Internet access available to children. By this report, it appears some Australians thought they'd be able to "opt out" of the filtering, but reportedly not. There will be two levels filtering that blocks content inappropriate for children (not clear how that's defined) and filtering that only blocks illegal content, which presumably means child abuse images. ISPs told TechWorld that the blanket filtering "will cripple Internet speeds because the technology is not up to scratch." The government's about to run a field trial to iron out any kinks, according to TechWorld.

National filtering for Oz may happen

It may still happen after all, I mean. After declaring the Howard government's effort to have the Internet filtered for households nationwide a failure, Australia's new Rudd government will persevere with the program. It's now in a test phase, Australian IT reports. "ISP-based filters will block inappropriate web pages at service provider level and automatically relay a clean feed to households. To be exempted, users will have to individually contact their ISPs." The filtering was the centerpiece of the Howard government's $189 million NetAlert program launched last August," the Sydney Morning Herald reported earlier.