Tuesday filtering wrap up: Conroy’s blog, AISA, Greens and the trial of doom
December 9, 2008 – 10:09 pm
Another busy day of filtering news with the Greens calling on the Government to abandon their live ISP trial as ‘as it’s flawed and doomed to failure‘. Senator Ludlam said:
“This trial is simply all show. It won’t give any meaningful indication of how mandatory internet filtering would work in practice. One of the few Internet Service Providers participating is only doing so to prove to the Government that it won’t work. We won’t even get a sense of the impact of the filter on internet performance, because the trial is not even going to be using real customers. “
Asher Moses and SMH call it with the headline ‘Labor plan to censor internet in shreds‘. “Shreds,” alright.
Back at ALP HQ the boys at the DBCDE and Lindsay Tanner have teamed up to blog about the digital economy. One issue they want to explore is ‘how do we maintain the same ‘civil society’ we enjoy offline in an online world?’ So far a good section of the comments are related to filtering, but they are moderated. Commenter Ben Gray writes:
“Senator Conroy refuses to listen to anyone with any technical knowledge of how the internet works, so why would we think that this blog represents anything more than an over-stuffed, never emptied “suggestions” box, which constitutes more of an insult to peoples’ intelligence than it does represent “an open dialogue”?”
Tanner and Conroy — It sounds like an unsexy ’80s cop show. A case of Good Cop, Bad Cop Jon Seymour writes.
Speaking of that scene, the The Australian Information Security Association says the primary objectives of the government’s plan to block unwanted content will not work effectively, potentially wasting millions of dollars of tax-payer money.
Individuals who are motivated to seek unwanted content, will, with a 100% certainty in AISA’s opinion, continue be able to do so by bypassing the filtering in a number of trivial and not so trivial ways.
Sometimes those trying to protect us, like Bernadette McMenamin, simply become blinded. She says the Telstra’s decision not to take part in the live trials was ‘a black day for Australia’ and that ‘this indicates that Telstra is not committed to banning child pornography and we should question its values.’
Other news and blog coverage:
- ZDNet: List of ISPs who put in an EOI
- Crikey: Why Internet Filtering Won’t Work, is Wrong and Dangerous
- Public Polity: Political background could explain underlying motive for ISP filtering
- Servant of Chaos: With the Internet Filter It’s Not 2009, It’s 1984
- Danu Poyner: Net Censorship: What we can learn from The Howard Years
7 Responses to “Tuesday filtering wrap up: Conroy’s blog, AISA, Greens and the trial of doom”
I respect Bernadette McMenamin’s reasoning and opinion. Just not very much. Now Telstra is on the side of the paedophiles? Textbook straw man, and beneath reporting in a major newspaper I would have thought.
By Colin on Dec 9, 2008
Telsta refusing to get involved shows that they support child pornography? Get a grip!
I’m happy to see the DBCDE blog’s first post has 100+ comments so far, many of them critical of the plan but praising the government for its openness. Let’s hope the blog is more than just an overstuffed, never emptied suggestions box.
By Sam Clifford on Dec 9, 2008
I have a question about the filter. If the blacklist is supposed to be secret does that mean everytime we try and access a banned site we will get a deceitful “404 Error: This page does not exist” or “Time out Error” message like they do in China? This is how the Chinese government manages to keep its list secret – because you can never quite know for sure if the internet’s really busy, if the site is just down at its own end or if you’re blocked by the government filter there. Apparently, they even block and then unblock and then re-block sites with totally harmless content for no other reason than just to keep people guessing about what’s really blocked and what isn’t.
I ask this, because if we get a big red screen saying something like “This site is on the ACMA blacklist of banned sites. You are not permitted to access it” then I’m guessing the secret blacklist would not be very secret for very long. Is the government here going to lie to us about the sites we’re trying to access like the Chinese government lies to its people when its filter is activated in order to keep the what’s being filtered a secret?
By Daniel on Dec 9, 2008
Thats fairly interesting Daniel if that was the case and it said “This site is on the ACMA blacklist of banned sites” it wouldnt be too difficult to collate all these webpages and form a list of your own.
By Jarrod on Dec 10, 2008
You could you the absolutely brilliant site: http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com to test if a site is avialable for others or not.
HTH
By Phillip Molly Malone on Dec 10, 2008
don’t people like Bernadette McMenamin notice the irony in using the “think of the children” argument where pedophiles and child porn are concerned, think about it very carefully for a minute
it’s because of those sickos “thinking of the children” that such filth even exists
By blind_dead_mcjones on Dec 10, 2008
Is Bernadette McMenamin taking part in the live trials? If not, that indicates that she isn’t commited to banning child pornography, and we should question her values!
Also, i see she hasn’t said anything about preventing arson!
By Stush on Dec 10, 2008