UPDATE: This post was followed up by another post summarising core points from these comments: http://www.katelundy.com.au/2009/12/21/further-thoughts-on-the-filter/ and then by
Q and A from my thoughts on the internet filter and the specific ammendments the Senator is proposing to the Labor Caucus to modify the policy are on the My thoughts on the Safer Internet Group statement blog post.
First, a bit of history: Whilst the call for a mandatory filter had originally come from some Christian and parent groups, the idea attracted cross factional attention in the ALP when Clive Hamilton from the Australia Insititute brought a broad left view into the debate calling for a mandatory filter, not to mention declaring that it was indeed feasible prior to the 2004 election campaign. This had an impact within the party. Very soon after the 2004 election I was moved out of the IT shadow portfolio by Mark Latham, and federal Labor adopted a policy of filtering, provided it was cost effective and technically feasible.
When the Rudd Labor opposition reaffirmed the policy on a mandatory internet filter prior to the 2007 federal election, it was largely a conceptual policy that sought to protect people who felt vulnerable and exposed to unwanted online content, that in other mediums had some form of censorship applied. The details still had to be developed. It was also contingent on an ISP filter actually being effective and workable.
At the time, I took comfort in the seemingly well-established ‘fact’ that such a filter was not technically feasible and that any reasonable test would establish this ‘fact’ yet again. Certainly at the time of the former Howard Government’s notorious Online Services Bill in 1998, studies showed that such filters were neither cost effective nor technically feasible.
This view of technical non-feasiblility was echoed strongly around the industry in 2007 and since, so the Minister did what a sensible Minister would do pursuant to the policy on the books: test the technology and the industry’s claims along with it.
In the meantime, the debate and discussion about the merits or otherwise of mandatory censorship per se being applied to the internet manifested itself instead in discussion and debate about just what was proposed to be filtered.
To Minister Conroy’s credit, he tackled the issue of defining exactly what was proposed as being filtered: the content that could not be regulated here because it was not on a server in Australia, and was incabable of being classified within our system of classification, hence refused classification, or ‘RC’.
His announcement that it was RC material that was to be subject to the filter was helpful and resolved some concern about the lack of detail of what was to be censored and fuelled conspiracy theories about the loss of freedoms. Material that is deemed RC by a properly skilled entity such as the classification board affords more confidence than the previous methodology, which had given rise to much of the concern about unjustified, unfair or plain wrong blacklisting of web sites based on complaints because there was no transparent system or method of picking the sites.
With the issue of ‘what’ being resolved, the ‘how’ still remained to be resolved by a series of ‘tests’ conducted by industry. For all intents and purposes (and I am aware of the debate about the technical detail and scope) the testers have said that the tests were successful (media release and report).
Did I expect this? Frankly, no. Was Clive Hamilton right? Probably not at the time he said it. But again, for all intents and purposes, the Minister had abided by his commitment to ensure the policy was grounded in evidence that it did what it said it did. The industry’s original claims that the filters were not feasible were proved false.
What Minister Conroy has never said is that the filter will guarantee people will never be exposed to RC content. He can’t say that and he understands why. What he has said all along is that this is one tool in a tool kit of policies to make the internet safer.
This is where a lot of passionate opponents of the filter get very frustrated “well if it doesn’t work 100%, why do it?” The answer is because the Rudd Labor Government is convinced it will encourage concerned people that the internet will be a safer place for themselves and/or their children.
However, people with a deep abiding commitment to a truly open internet, the very idea of introducing a mandatory filter will always be an anathema, no matter the definitional limitations to what is being censored or how accountable/transparent that process is.
Unfortunately, the debate about whether reducing the risks of people being exposed to unwanted online content through mandatory filters outweighs the value people place on the concept of an open and unflitered internet was resolved by the Rudd government before the last election, when the policy was announced. So it is not surprising many people feel they have not had the opportunity to have this debate.
So where to next? With a policy announced and the tests done and the definition of what is to be filtered resolved there is little room to move. Given the principle of openess associated with the internet is for some, irreconcilable with mandatory filtering no matter how it is done, one approach may be to allow ISPs, if they chose, to offer adults an ‘opt out’. The problem with this however will be that many people are unlikely to be comfortable with an opt-out given the inevitable stigma that will be attached to “wanting” access to RC content. It may also lead to interest by the authorities, even though individuals may simply want to ensure they are not having legitimate content filtered.
In many respects this will be the practical effect as it is assumed that the filters will be circumvented, with the defiant justification being defending this principal of openess anyway. However by creating a legitimate mechanism, the strongly held diverse views within our population would be respected while still adhering to the Rudd Labor election commitment of providing a mandatory filter.
My past statements clearly outline my preferred approach of more effective parental education and support, including filters at the desktop and improving confident use of the intenet throughs skills development across a range of community, education and work-based strategies.
So my plan is to advocate within my party an approach which recognises the openess principle that underpins the Internet as I have argued for in the past. This discussion is rightly an internal one, and I have no doubt that the public will be expressing their view as they have already started to do. In this regard I urge constructive and sensible debate. Remember that Minister Conroy is implementing an election commitment determined by the whole Cabinet.
I want to thank people for the respect they have shown me on this issue too, given my previous advocacy and obvious discomfort with the current approach. I am also firm in my belief that this debate does not diminish the exciting work we are doing with the NBN, in Gov 2.0 and other areas of ICT policy. I will always be committed to realising our ICT-related social and economic potential.
Finally, I want to be very clear that ultimately, as a Senator in the Labor Government I will be bound by Labor Caucus’ position on the matter. I remain supportive of Minister Conroy and will work closely with him to reach the best possible outcome. I do believe that the intention of this policy remains noble – to protect our young and vulnerable. I am keenly aware that many mechanisms used by criminal networks will not be stopped through a filtering mechanism, and I believe the complementary strategies being put in place are good, such as increased funding for the AFP to tackle cybercrime and online safety education.
I will follow the online conversations closely as always and look forward to your feedback.
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Kate, you can be sure that the next Federal Election will be the first time in nearly 30 years that I do not vote Labour.
I fall into the “deep abiding commitment to a truly open internet” category. My commitment to freedom is greater than my commitment to your part.
No debate, no vote.
Very disappointing.
Will this get you a ministry?
“This discussion is rightly an internal one” — so Labor is no longer interested in public opinion?
The election after this one might be close, in which case you will miss the few percent of votes this looses. Labor, just like the Liberals but less so.
But if you write this sort of article you need to prevent people from commenting.
Anthony
Dear Kate,
Show some backbone to go with your brains – This is an issue worth crossing the floor over! You obviously understand the issues better than most, and I would urge you to do everything in your power to stop this filter from going ahead. The filter plan is not the reason I voted your government into power – there were a few small issues like climate change and work choices, and this was just slipped in under the radar. Australia is not an ultra-conservative country; why does the current Labour leadership think that the easily-offended need to be pandered to?
Forget weasel debate over over the 2007 policy statement. Your statements during the Howard years created the general perception that Labor was going to be the modern tech and Net smart party who understood and respected the value of the Internet and the rights of Net users. Instead, what you have delivered to us is Stephen Conroy, the equivalent of Richard Alston from hell. I cannot really figure Labor’s motivation for this mandatory Internet censorship scheme. If Conroy genuinely believes what he is saying, he can’t be qualified to be in his role. The more likely possibility is that there is another agenda, as there sometimes is when the government is dead keen to push through seemingly irrational and clearly unpopular legislation. Any way you look at it, this thing stinks and if it goes through, although I have always voted Labor, I’ll be voting green in the next election.
Kate, you need to change your slogen ‘taking Australia forward with openness and vision’ since you are taking Australia backwards and you clearly have no vision.
Kate,
from all these comments, you must see this issue is a nail in the coffin for the ALP, come election time.
Your statements are disturbingly verging on Fascism!
The people are begging you to have some humanity and cross the floor on this vote.
For your sake and credibility and Australia’s democratic freedom I hope you do the right thing.
You are Kate Lundy a Senator voted for by the people not a puppet.
Good Luck!
Let’s spend lots of money making the internet slower and more expensive for Australian working families. Good one, Senator Conroy! Sounds like a real vote catcher.
I am disgusted. censorship is censorship.
Ms Lundy, Almost Anonymous is right on the money. Your decision to ‘stay the party line’ demonstrates that Labor politicians are scared witless to dissent. This censorship is fraught with problems and is totally unnecessary. It will leave Australia exposed to being dictated to by other countries who will require restrictions to sites because they are either political or contrary to their perceived trade agreements, ie. USA copyright or access to music, video etc.
To make the ridiculous claim of ‘protecting our children’ is just laughable. Our children are just so so much smarter than many of our politicians. Whatever happened to the meaning of ‘freedom’ aka ‘democracy’?
Please change your mind and listen to the majority.
‘censed:
That’s absolutely correct. Conroy himself cuts the legs right out from under the “protecting the children” line by making his own arguments.
Seriously: Find me a single parent that’s sympathetic to the “protecting the children” argument who’ll feel comfortable with a censorship system which lets R18+ and X18+ pornography through.
Lets ask Mr. Rudd what he thinks of that:
“Mr. Rudd… Kevin. Can I call you Kevin? Ok, great. Kevvie, are you comfortable with protecting children with something that your own Minister says will let through hard-core porn without a second thought? Really? God, how retarded are you?”
The whole line of reasoning is intellectually bankrupt, and Conroy ought to be ashamed of himself for making it. Sen Lundy, of all people, knows better than to say, “the Rudd Labor Government is convinced it will encourage concerned people that the internet will be a safer place for themselves and/or their children.”
– mark
Why not talk to Penny Sharp? as she seems to proof that free thought in parliament may still be possible
http://pennysharpe.com/redleather/15/12/2009/why_the_internet_filter_is_not_the_solution_we_wish_it_was
Labor has already lost my vote – as someone has already said this whole thing has shown me that you cannot be trusted to lead the Australian people and that you are not working FOR the Australian people
OK, I seriously need to ask. Why does Senator Conroy still have a job? I mean, seriously, over 95% of the Australian population are against this and his brilliant defense… to call the whole nation Paedophiles.
Kate, please stand up for the Australian populace. We voted Labor in and we can just as easily vote you out. We are the voice you should listen to not caucus.
What Senator Conroy is pushing for is what the Christian Fundamentalists desire, *not* what the Australia voted for. Grow a backbone and stand up for us as Penny Sharpe and others are now doing.
Come election time, those people will retain their seats, not the ones who back Senator Conroy.
I guess it’s time for Kate Lundy to make a decision as to whether she not only cares about people who voted labor who have been lied too but about the Australian population in general and fundamental freedoms. I have never seen such a unanimous opposition against a government policy, not only in tech savy circles but equally amongst all Australians from all walks of life.
Or will you keep supporting your political party no matter what, even if they have the “internet villain of the year” as the telecommunications minister.
It’s people in your position that have the ability to make your own party understand that sometimes they get their stuff wrong, SERIOUSLY wrong.
Australia is watching very closely and are now extremely informed about what this filter really means when it comes to freedom of information and freedom of opinion and speech and they are all pointing the finger at “labor”.
As a further, late addition to this debate… If you’d like to know why people have no confidence in the government’s ability censor without scope creep, particularly without resorting to blocking political opposition, I refer you to two incidents.
The first took place in late October, where the Department attempted to silence a high-profile critic of the policy by pressuring an industry body and his employers:
The second took place today, where the http://stephen-conroy.com.au protest site had its domain name registration abruptly supended, without being given real reason as to why. The speed at which this action was taken – following a news article on the site – and the register’s sudden suspension of its normal policy of allowing challenged registrations 20 days to respond, suggest that the agency was pressured, or feared some sort of political repercussion.
To the Anti-Filter Bogans
[Look at the history of any media,it is a self explainatory process that rules are resisted or embraced dependent on who gains /loses.]
Now what was your argument again?
So you have decided to toe the party line…good on ya.
Can I just remind you that you were elected to represent the people, not the party?
You know this is BS
Kate Lundy has been a great supporter of open source, Linux and the ICT industry in general for many years. Still remember Kate from the Open Government panel at Linuxconf Adelaide a years back. I consider Kate the most tech savvy of all politicians, and wished her to replace Alston (different party) at the time. Alston turned out to be not half bad. Compare to Conroy and the current mess, Alston was Obama. Sen. Conroy has so far, refuse to engage industry experts, refuse to build dialogue with the community, and refuse to be interviewed by the media in depth on this issue.
GetUp and other advocacy groups should build up awareness in Sen. Conroy’s own electorate, and make sure that he is voted out of his seat (but keep the Rudd govt). Kate would be the logical choice. However, siding with Sen. Conroy on this issue is definitely NOT the way to do it. This issue is a vote changer – this is Labor’s workchoices.
To end on a positive note, thanks Kate for opening up this blog, very courageous.
You’re a disgrace to your party and the people who voted for you. I quit the Labor Party several years ago*, due to its inexorable drift to the right. The Greens are now what Labor once was. A pox on the lot of you.
Vote Green!
*I will verify this for you if you email a request to do so.
Kate, there do come times when an must as a matter of conscience oppose policies of their party.
The real question is whether party discipline and cohesion comes ahead of principle.
The proposed mandatory filtering of the internet is a direct attack on freedom of speech and so antagonistic to democratic principles that I hope that you wil find the strength to vote NO to this legislation.
I think your mission statement “Taking Australia forward with openness and vision” is the diametric to Conroys backward step with internet filtering. The protest site stevenconroy.com.au has already been sut down. Is this the example of how political dissent on the internet will be handled by your government. Shut down! This is not only a backward step for our country and a complete contradiction of your own mission statement, but an intrusion on our civil liberties. Wake up! “Man is not free unless government is limited”.
Kate,
I hope you can walk the streets of Canberra with your head held high.
Canberra has a large well educated ICT sector and many people a disgusted at the the thought of a mandatory filter with a SECRET Blacklist. Amazingly this is Fascism!
It is still not too late, you can be a hero for the people and democracy of Australia or go down in history as a puppet to the Fascists in the corridors of power
I guess in your socialist utopia Kate we believe everything the Labor party says.Unfortunetly you havent done a good enough job of dumbing us down yet.A very dark period in Australian history
I think Kate Lundy would be very wise to listen to the words of Juatice Michael Kirby and his 4 parables during his address to IIA:
http://iia.net.au/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=617&Itemid=32
I would especially suggest that attention is paid to his comments on the limitations of government power and his remarks at the end of the 4th parable.
Some very good posts here. I’d like to add that I’m a Labor supporter but I also consider myself a swing voter every once in a while. I wait until the current government becomes arrogant and stops listening to it’s constituents before I swing against the party. The NSW labor government will more than likely lose their next election for this very reason, this is precisely why the Howard government lost at the last election.
I would have hoped that the Rudd government would last longer than one term but I feel that they have already started to become arrogant. I won’t support a government that feels it will ignore 96% of it’s constituents who DON’T want mandatory filtering. The arrogance comes in because the Rudd government has the attitude that it can go against 96% of the people and they’ll still be voted in come the next election.
I predict this outcry will gain momentum over the next month or so, and this mandatory filter will become the Work Choices of the Labor government.
I don’t believe anyone is against filtering per se, it’s the mandatory and secretive nature that is of concern. There is no national security issue, so one can only assume there are other political motives at work here. There is absolutely no logical reason why this can’t be an Opt-in, or even at worst an Opt-out filter. Somehow the Rudd government believes this isn’t good enough. This is why as a labor supporter I will not be voting labor at the next election unless this policy is changed.
I’m writing to add my name to the long list of people opposed to this disgraceful policy proposal.
I’m also adding my two cents to the lack of democracy the population has, given that you are being coerced to vote for the censorship by your own party. Apparently majority opinion means nothing. It’s only what the lobby groups, corporations and knee-jerk reactionaries in the party office say that counts.
Disappointed? Not at all. Furious at your (and your colleagues’) lack of willingness to support true democracy? Damn straight.
Bacically what you are saying is when push comes to shove your job is more impotant than our freedom…………..
The Waffen SS were only carrying out their orders as well Kate.
PLEASE DO… “..protect our young and vulnerable….”
By leaving Parenting to the Parents and not giving NANNY STATE control over to Ministers who are keen to censor Australian websites EVEN WITHOUT the filter in place.
Enough is enough, the ANZACS died to preserve our freedoms. Freedom of choice, freedom to choose.
DONT TAKE AWAY WHAT LITTLE WE HAVE LEFT in this prison colony Society called United States of (israeli occupied) Australia. We, the people have heard enough lies from pollichickens already.
Labor has certainly lost my vote over this one.
I am aghast at the complete failure of any MP to acknowledge the patently rational points of those opposing the filter.
As many have stated, the filter will not do the thing(s) it is supposed to do. This isn’t a matter of opinion – it’s obvious to a numbskull.
Clearly there is another agenda here. Shame on you, pro-filter politicians for playing such a transparent game of your own when our fundamental rights are at stake.
‘Fact’ – Kate Lundy, you have now shown yourself as nothing more than a gutless hypocrite, who obviously has no principles other than to try to keep a cushy job in the Labor party.
‘Fact’ – This policy will simply not stop the production of illegal material in the first place.
‘Fact’ – this “filter” is nothing more than ‘censorship’.
‘Fact’ – This policy tries to hide behind the banning of illegal material, which is already in place, to now ‘restrict” any content that some group of faceless individuals will now determine what is “inappropriate” for everyone else in this country.
‘Fact’ – You and Conroy are simply pandering to the right wing, religious creeps that obviously now pervade the Labor party and who wish to impose their so called ‘beliefs’ on everyone else.
‘Fact’ – I will never vote for you, your pathetic comrades, or Labor ever again.
Oh, and on another issue, will you and Bob McMullan, stop putting your propaganda in my letterbox. It says “No junk mail” for a reason, and that includes anything that comes from politicians.
Quote:
“However, people with a deep abiding commitment to a truly open internet, the very idea of introducing a mandatory filter will always be an anathema, no matter the definitional limitations to what is being censored or how accountable/transparent that process is.”
Those who oppose this not concern with a filter on the internet… they are concerned with censorship in any form… for “no matter the definitional limitations to what is being censored” there will always be an opportunity for parties or individuals to exploit the filter for their own benefit… any form of censorship should be confronted at any cost, if only to prevent the smallest infringement of Australians democratic right to free speech…
Whether or not Free Speech is enshrined in the Australian Constitution, we are party and signatory the the UNs declaration on free speech… by adopting such a policy we are threatening the very right that this declaration tries to uphold.
My vote will go elsewhere if the ALP adopts this policy
I agree.
Please check out(funny/satirical)web videos about senator
S. Conroy and Internet filtering.
http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/activism_non_profit/watch/v18045797mcEsHXBx
http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/activism_non_profit/watch/v19535861qtWz29Ph
Thank you.
Long as Politicians fail to see the MASSIVE distinctions between old age mediums – like TV, Books and Radio and attempting to lump the ‘Internet’ under legislation and thinking usually applied to those mediums. We will always have these policies that are poorly thought out and even more poorly implemented.
It’s a serious problem Law makers are treating the Internet like it was a book. And the continued out-dated dogmatic approach will not keep up with the rate of technological progress.
THE INTERNET IS AN ENVIRONMENT NOT A MEDIUM!
The scale is gigantic and expanding exponentially.
The Internet was MADE to route around damage and therefore by a byproduct any level of Censorship.
Its USER driven. Anyone and everyone can upload to websites what ever the hell they want.
Sharing Person to Person what ever they want.
Make software that continues to push the Internet in weird ways (Twitter for example).
The way to regulate the internet is the same we regulate real life. THE POLICE.
It also makes current day Classifications completely obsolete. Look at the none-R18+, for video games. Has it stopped anyone from accessing this material – No. Will Atkinson’s stubborn approach do anything – No. Does this frighten him – Yes.
The slow moving processes of Politics and legislating have become to slow to catch up let alone keep up. By the time this Filter is put into place the Internet will have transformed into something that the Filters were never meant for. Dog meet Tail.
“The internet is a city and, like any great city, it has monumental libraries and theatres and museums and places in which you can learn and pick up information and there are facilities for you that are astounding – specialised museums, not just general ones.
But there are also slums and there are red light districts and there are really sleazy areas where you wouldn’t want your children wandering alone.
And you say, “But how do I know which shops are selling good gear in the city and how do I know which are bad? How do I know which streets are safe and how do I know which aren’t?” Well you find out.
What you don’t need is a huge authority or a series of identity cards and police escorts to take you round the city because you can’t be trusted to do it yourself or for your children to do it.
And I think people must understand that about the internet – it is a new city, it’s a virtual city and there will be parts of it of course that they dislike, but you don’t pull down London because it’s got a red light district.” – Stephen Fry.
Kate, I’ve always regarded you as a sensible voice when it comes to IT issues, so I’m both surprised and dismayed at your take on this filtering issue. It’s difficult not to be cynical and say that you’ve compromised your principles for the sake of party discipline, which brands you as just another career politician.
I’d like to opt out of the internet filter, and I’d also like to opt out of religious interference. Unfortunately, the Government seems to be happy to opt me in through its pandering to the god botherers. Please help me make the world a better place: http://www.redbubble.com/people/realism/t-shirts/4319760-1-your-imaginary-friend-is-messing-with-my-internets
Perhaps instead of a controversial filter of dubious effectiveness then maybe some technology that specifically targets the main cause of concern.
http://microsoftphotodna.com/
Hi Kate.
The numbers don’t add up.
Conroy says that the secret black list will be limited to 10000 urls as this is all that the filter can handle.
The internet is one trillion (1000000000000) urls and growing at 1 billion (1000000000) urls a day.
At most you can only block one 1000000th of the internet. Even if one percent of this is RC (most of chich is legal to view and read material) you can only block one 100000th of the RC sites.
This does not seem to an effective filter, or a good way to spend taxpayers money.
No silver bullet indeed!
You’ve (Labour that is) have lost my vote too. I can only hope that the Liberals have the guts to take a stand on this and throw it out of the Senate. There is no substitute for parental control. If parents don’t care then you should be looking at the parents not blocking every Australian’s internet. Try educating people and making an opt in filter available.
Publishing the results of a seriously flawed trial and saying they are 100% effective is the same as saying the filter will make the internet safe. What about all the experts in the field who are saying that A/ the trial was seriously flawed and B/ what Conroy is proposing is technically not feasible. Are these people wrong?
To oppose a filter when you believe it’s not feasible and then change sides when you think you might be out of step with your parliamentary colleagues is unforgivable Kate. You are there to represent your constituents.
Mr Conroy (since you’re popping in to Kate’s blog), are you prepared to state categorically that if it is proved that sites other than those you have stated above are blocked by your filter that no-one wants, you will remove it (the filter) and resign……I doubt it very much. The bottom line with what will be blocked and what won’t is that people just don’t believe you and don’t trust the government (any government) to administer what amounts to a secret list.
By the way…..I am against you and your plan, but I am most definitely not a child molesting, pornography lover. I’m 55 and have been connected to the internet for 15 years and I have never “accidentally” been exposed to the type of material you are trying to block.
“Taking Australia forward with openness and vision”
Just like the vision of an open internet, Senator?
You used to be cool. Now you doom yourself to irrelevance like the rest of your party, Fielding and the Libs.
Dear Kate:
I was amazed to read your carefully crafted words. I feel you have a deep internal conflict with this one.
So I decided to look into this successful report that you base your decision on:
Notes from the Enex TestLab Report 2009/12/19
1) The Checklist:
The ACMA checklist consists of 1000 URLs. Telstra tested up to 10,000 URLS. All with 100% success rate of blocking. I’m Impressed, but strangely surprised that blocking 1000 URLS was seen as an important milestone. I used a 386 to filter more than that back in 2001.
2) Circumvention:
NB Quotes are for text taken from the report.
“A technically competent user could, if they wished, circumvent the filtering technology.”
There is a whole section devoted to circumvention, It contains percentages of circumvention success for various of the many mechanisms.
and -
“stronger circumvention prevention measures can result in greater degradation of internet performance”
3) Accuracy:
The 100% success.
“All six ISPs achieved 100 percent accuracy in blocking the ACMA blacklist. This was a requirement of the pilot”. This sentence is the reason for the touted 100% success rate. However for other more comprehensive types of blocking –
“In blocking additional categories of content all six ISPs achieved 78 percent to 84 percent accuracy”
and …
“One hundred percent accuracy using these commercial lists is unlikely to be achieved as the content on different commercial lists varies and there is a high rate at which new content is created on the internet”.
This high rate of content creation also gets mentioned later
“An increasingly common technique used to negate filters is known as ‘fast fluxing’ and involves the rapid and automated change in IP addresses….employed by providers of content”
Hmm, a filtering arms race is about to start, congratulations.
4) Detecting False Positives- Blocking bad content is only part of whats blocked.
“Testing was also undertaken against a list of content, prepared by Enex, considered to be innocuous and which should not be blocked by a filter. All participants experienced some level of over-blocking in this test (i.e. blocking of some legitimate URLs). All filters blocked less than 3.4 percent of such content.”
5) Performance:
This system provides a mechanism for hackers to disrupt an ISP.
“Telstra reported that heavy traffic sites could overload its trial filtering solution if included in the filtering blacklist. This is also the case for all filters presented in the pilot.”
“…will all affect performance, and can do so at 40 percent performance degradation over theoretical maximum line-rate, or more in some cases.”
I remember in 2001 setting up just such a list to protect my ‘kids’. at that time the list was already over 100,000. By the strict success criteria, it also was 100% successful. Oh and it also contained many false positives and was completely unmanageable.
“Telstra (not a member of the trial) found that there was no discernible impact on end-user experiences with a list size of 10,000 URLs. Telstra describes the impact as equivalent to one seventieth of the blink of an eye.”
“It can therefore have an affect on performance if not planned and implemented correctly and of sufficient scale and capacity to handle the flow of traffic.”
Some of the worst results
“Filtering ACMA blacklist and additional content
ISP Streaming Download test Upload-test Latency test Web page Download test
Participant2 with SolutionA
44.15% 1.11% 3.71% -0.10%
Participant5
35.80% 20.56% -0.97% 36.45%…….”
Some of the best
“Participant1
-17.32% -16.95% -5.95% 0.46%
Participant2 with SolutionF
11.00% 27.20% -4.90% 5.24%
”
6) Customer/Subject Response:
“Overall the service offered by the ISPs was considered effective by customers, with around two-thirds of customers participating in the survey indicating that they would either probably or definitely continue using additional content filtering services.”
It can therefore be assumed that one third of the customers, would probably or definitely not continue using the service.
“Customers expressed the view that it was important for there to be mechanisms for self-management of the filter settings and improved visibility of the filter in action.”
My Conclusion:
I’m only up to page 26 of the 94 pages in the report. To me this does not read as a successful test or success story. To say so on the basis of achieving one tightly defined criteria borders on mis-leading the public.
Lets be truthful:
. There will be performance impacts.
. These filters can be circumvented, relatively easily.
. making them harder to circumvent will reduce performance.
. We are opening ISPs to attack by hackers.
. They are not 100% accurate (by any real measure of accuracy)
. They will incorrectly block valid or approved sites.
Other interesting points.
. With a test by 9 ISP, the list was leaked. With every ISP in Australia then list will be leaked every day, which will bring the whole process into ridicule.
. Malicious. The system relies on the honesty of every worker in every ISP. Whats to stop someone adding ‘liberalParty.com.au’ to an ISPs list just for a few hours/days before an election. Because of the proposed secrecy this could be very hard to prove or to track. Oh and how hard is it to imagine ‘laborparty.com.au’ entering the list in some far future?
Kate Lundy
Taking Australia forward with openness and vision..
Im sorry Kate, I cant match your stance and this slogan. “Taking Australia” seems to be the only applicable part.
We the obvious majority of the people of Australia are reaching out to you, come into the light, stand tall with us.
Kate / Pia:
As a follow up on the credibility of the ‘test’.
“SAGE-AU says net filter tests unrealistic ”
See http://www.itwire.com/content/view/30126/1231/
for details. SAGE-AU have raised questions about the number of users, the fact that the test was not performed at the required Internet speed and other shortcomings.
Now you don’t have to use the test as a justification for approving an insane implementation of an unworkable policy.
I do hope you are reading these.
Thanks everyone for all the comments, links and information. We are reading them all and will post more soon.
Cheers,
Pia
Office of Senator Lundy
I honestly hope the Office of Senator Lundy is not going to arrogantly ignore this passionate topic, as it is gaining momentum, how can you as a Senator ignore the majority voter! And Conroy is just making a bigger fool of himself and the ALP(Rudd), constantly in the news.
“Conroy continues to soldier on with his censorship plans regardless of what the majority thinks.”
http://www.zdnet.com.au/insight/security/soa/Conroy-s-filter-just-the-beginning/0,139023764,339300141,00.htm
Pia thank you for the replies, I realise that this must be a very trying exercise for you both. Probably as trying for you as it is frustrating for us. To us this is an obviously bad idea/policy, even after a cursory glance and the fact that few in power seem to be standing up makes us wonder whats going on and many of us get angry.
I do hope that you are taking these comments and also passing them onto your Parliamentary colleagues.
Thanks, Andy
He kate, got your 30 pieces of gold for betraying your integrity yet?
Kiss your political career goodbye from here on in Kate.
If you refuse to support this stupidly backwards plan you face being kicked out of the party.
If you support the firewall, you WILL be removed by the wrath of the voting public.
Either way Kate. You’re numbers up.
All you have to do is select which option you’d like to be best remembered. The Savior or the Lap Dog? your choice.
Oh how I can’t wait for the next Election, where we can see a REAL Democracy at work. Not this version we’re being force fed now.
Kate,
Sorry to say you have no shame, the filter has been a gross waste of public money, the arrogant and ignorant attitude shown by the ALP is astonishing.
How can you now ignore the recent polls on major news sites, over 90% not wanting a filter?
These truly are dark times for Australian democracy. We are becoming a Totalitarian Democracy.
Our Soldiers are fighting and died for freedom and democracy on distant shores while at home freedom is being sucked straight out to sea. The ALP are walking tightrope high over moral ground!
I congratulate you on having an open blog with comments and opinions to be viewed by all– embracing technology and what democracy is allowing freedom of speech. Where is Stephen Conroy’s blog with open comments?
Unfortunately Kate you have shown your true colours and are not a Senator for the people, freedom, democracy and transparency.
Another vote lost.
I wouldn’t be surprised if all these comments are eventually pulled from your blog as they are not exactly positive! Your blog is getting a popular mention on whirlpool!!
Well Labor have officially lost my youth vote if they continue with this policy from the religous right. Having only that mad group as yer base will not win you the next election and or gain the senate I guarrantee that. Its sad to see that members of Labor party dont have the guts to stand up for whats right or wrong
. I was a Labor voter but now I’ll be directing my vote to the other parties which oppose the filter.
Build a case Pia? YOU KNOW THE CASE. KL knew it 10 years ago. The whole industry has told the Alston/Harradine team & now we’ve been telling the conroy/Fielding team. You wonder why most Australians are cynical about politics. Your Govt has no credibility in this industry. At best this is a monumental waste of tax dollars. Kate was against the blacklist implementation, now you know what’s on it, you’re for it? NOW we have to build a case? A compromise is unacceptable. Mandatory filtering is the domain of tyrants. Both Howard & Rudd had “me too” filtering policies at the last election to appease the ACL. We didn’t have a choice.
The ACL never had to “make a case,” they just make stuff up and reactionary elements within the ALP treat it like manna from heaven (as it were).
Why is it that the only people who ever have to “make a case” are advocates of openness and personal responsibility? Australia is in such a parlous condition that the “nanny state” is the default mindset, and the only way to change it is with compelling constant advocacy. I mean, geez, I know the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, but it isn’t supposed to be this hard.
Other parts of the world embrace progressivism with open arms, but here? Nope. In so many areas of policy we have too many politicians wetting their pants in absolute terror at imaginary phantasms, with public policy defined by whoever has the weirdest, freakiest, most extreme, most obsessive imagination. It really is embarrassing, and it’s such a phenomenal disappointment to see the new broom that swept through in 2007 reduced to this.
Look at the situation we’re in: We have a status quo which has served Australian citizens admirably for more than two decades: Open Internet access, with adults taking responsibility for their own conduct and their own children. A whole generation of Australian citizens has been brought up in the presence of this status quo, with no discernable change to the number of axe murderers hiding in everyone’s closets. By all accounts the Australian people have handled the societal changes brought about by the Internet brilliantly and deserve a good solid pat on the back for it.
Yet if you listen to the ALP right wing, that’s a regrettable state of affairs which desperately needs fixing through the imposition of top-down controls from a Government that obviously knows better than anyone else. Two decades of successful bottom-up community standards development is clearly unacceptable, and everything that happens needs to be regulated to within an inch of its life because the only way the ALP can preserve factional unity is to kow-tow to a small handful of moronic crazies on the right.
Disgusting. And so, so disappointing.
– mark
Dear Senator,
You make 2 comments that I take exception to.
The first is that the “what” of the filter has been resolved. On the contrary, it is still not clear exactly what content will be blocked. by definition, RC content has not been classified so we cannot say what kind of material it is. the guidelines used by the classification board and their ability to thoroughly check every site on the web are also questionable.
Your point about the trial being successful is also misleading. all the report says is that it is technically possible to filter a list of URLs with total accuracy and with little overhead. Duh!!! This is in no way a measure of the effectiveness of the scheme as a whole. To be a measure of anything meaningful, we would need to know if the blacklist can be kept up to date and how accurately it reflects the content we want to filter. it is possible for proxy servers and URL redirection to be implemented easily and cheaply so what should have been measured is the amount of prohibited content still available after the filter was applied. I suspect the effectiveness would have been much closer to 0% than 100%. What might be easier to filter of course is politically controversial material (of which there is much less). The whole scheme would make more sense if this was the Government’s true agenda.
What I would like to know is, how do you think you and the previous government differ in your attitude to participatory democracy?
Yours Sincerely,
Yehuda Harmor
One last comment from me. I don’t know this whole thing will “play out politically”. There is an article on Pollytics that predicts no politically fallout for Labor at all. W
I don’t know where this will play out. There’s an article on Pollytics that predicts no fallout for Labor at all on the issue. Whatever the case, I do not think that it is smart politics to cheese off 96 percent of 20000 people who answer a poll on internet censorship.
This is, amongst other things, a great wedge issue for Labor. That’s not a normative comment. For me I can’t express my disgust at Labor for cynically using this issue just to score political points. It has certainly in my eyes taken down the Labor ideology for the rest of my life. I never thought that Labor ideology was that libertarian; but I certainly thought that they were better than this.
With the mad monk wanting to put a bible in every government school I am utterly frustrated by Australian politics. Heck. Am I libertarian because I oppose taking this country back 400 years to a union of church of state?? In relative terms now that seems to make me libertarian. And that is very worrying.
Certainly I see Kevin Rudd very differently upon adoption of this issue. To me he is frankly just another religious nutter in bed with other religious nutters. He no longer has the remotest intent of acting in my interests – not even when my interests are so minimal as to be able to use the internet as an adult.
Hi Kate,
I voted Labor at the last election and I probably will do so at the next, but only for the Lower House. I will, for the first time. vote for the Greens in the Senate as I feel quite strongly about this issue.
My main concerns are that this will be mandatory and the list of banned URLs will be kept secret. I can understand the reluctance in revealing sites that harbour child porn but why need to hide the other sites?
Regards,
Steve Beek
Refused Classification includes “revolting and abhorrent phenomena” that “offend against the standards of morality”. Does someone know if that would include photos of victims of war crimes, for example civilians burnt alive by white phosphorous in the Iraq War? Or of prisoners being tortured in US custody?
Some future war hysteria will inevitably widen the scope of the filter.
Good to see Pia Waugh, is still involved in constructive communication.
Where there is dialog there is hope.
Do I detect that not all hope is lost with Kate?
If people can post constructive useful information or links that Kate can collate to hopefully to persuade for an opt-in filter… well we can dream!
The ENEX test was fundamentally flawed by not testing real-world conditions, and cannot be held as any evidence that mandatory filtering will not slow down Internet access. The ENEX test did not even comply with the technical requirements established before the trial began – ENEX should be stripped of their considerable fee.
Any policy and legislation that uses the ENEX test result as justification should be opposed – its rubbish.
I think you’re being too hard on Enex Testlabs here. Yes, their report was flawed, but I don’t think it was their fault.
If you’re asked to write a government report, you answer the questions that you’re asked, not the questions that you really think should have been asked. They even admitted some of the limitations in the report itself.
They didn’t even answer the questions that were asked.
Here’s the technical testing framework which formed the statement of requirements for Enex:
http://www.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/89160/technical-testing-framework.pdf
Things Enex didn’t test:
* IPv6
* Speeds “up to 12 megabits per second”
* “the capacity of filters to detect and provide warnings on circumvention attempts.”
Probably all sorts of others – they’re the things that jumped out after a quick skim, rather than a line-by-line comparison between the statement of requirements and the report.
They also appear to have flunked first year stats. E.g., adding averages without including Standard Errors, thereby making their tables of performance degradation useless. Not including sample sizes alongside their percentages is frankly a hopeless omission.
I’m not going to criticize the data in the report itself (because god knows, it’s a gift to those of us who oppose the policy, and I have confidence that a company with a reputation to defend like Enex wouldn’t deliver made-up results).
But the gaps in the testing protocols, the questionable analysis of the results, and the press-release style of the executive summary are, in my opinion, open for full public debate.
– mark
Did you read the same document that I did? The framework document contained a lot of “to the extent possible” and “potential [...] to be considered”.
IPv6 is a good example of something that, while desirable, couldn’t realistically be tested in the environment provided, given the lack of IPv6 clients.
As for the “press release” executive summary… in my experience, over half of them read like that.
I resisted making this point a couple of times because I didn’t want it to look like a cheap shot. It does seriously get to the level of my disenchantment with Labor on this.
I don’t intend this as a cheap shot. I understand Labor’s reputation for party unity around policy decisions. That doesn’t reduce my unease with this at all though. A description of Labor that really rang true with me around this particular policy came from an article that described the party as appearing to be schizophrenic when you compare this policy to others. On one hand we have statements of vision around NBN, open and transparent government, vision for national infrastructure. On the other hand we have this.
“Taking Australia forward with openness and vision” in your site banner. That’s honestly what I hoped we were in for when I voted for Labor at the last federal election. I certainly didn’t see openness and vision coming from the Howard Liberal party.
My wife was the same going into the last election. This policy really sours that voting choice though. I can’t see much hope of me voting Labor next time around.
It seems like Senator Conroy has turned the phrase “evidence based policy” into a perverse marketing term and while I used to see potential in Labor for “Taking Australia forward with openness and vision” I can’t see myself thinking that way again any time soon.
Lost me based purely on Conroys lies. He can look straight at you a spew forth garbage. The last 12 months has been a disaster for Labor. Enjoy yourself as your run in office is nearly over.
Internet censorship is a form of terrorism.
It really is this simple.
The Labor Party do not rule the country; they are elected to represent the citizens. Stephen Conroy, Kate Lundy and Kevin Rudd were all born naked and screaming just like me. Over time they chose to work towards representing me in my national parliament whilst I chose to work in other fields. I never gave any MP the right to tell me what to do.
I never completely relinquished my right to contribute to public debate and politics. I am entitled to contribute to public debate and deserve the right to be heard. I certainly think some of the responses from the office published here are condescending and patronising and indicate that public consultation is just lip service. Not one remark from Pia has thoroughly acknowledged or apologised for the significant difference between the pre-elected ALP stance and the one that is being ushered in under the chaos of Christmas. Many important points put by concerned citizens have not been addressed and Kate Lundy has barely contributed to “her” blog.
I also have the right to vote. Part of my right to vote is the right to be informed. Internet censorship is just one device that jeopardises my right to be informed. Breaking electoral promises also destroys my right to be an informed voter. The ALP policy and public statements did not say that my internet would be filtered. In fact, the ALP clearly said that I would not have to accept filters if I did not want them. At no stage did they put their proposal in its current form to the citizens of Australia.
In closing, I contend that my rights as a human are above those of the rights of the ALP or parliament. My right to access information overrides the role of the government. A government may only intervene in my activities if the citizens wish it to do so and then only if my activity harms another, hence taking away another human’s rights. Viewing and interacting with ideas that harm no other person is my right and I will defend it against any other human who tries to take that away from me. In this case, I will rally support from my friends, family and any other human I come in contact with. I will also vote against any candidate that supports this policy and campaign against any party who mistakenly believes that they can tell me what to do.
It’s incredibly frustrating that the politicians don’t seem to realise how IMPORTANT this issue is. Thousands of people like me are trying to make it clear that this is the ONE issue that will decide our vote. I freely state that I consider Tony Abbott to be a very poor choice of Prime Minister even among the Liberals, but if Labor continue with this filtering policy, I will not even CONSIDER any other issue when voting except this one, because this constitutes a direct attack on Australia’s standing as a free nation, one where information is not controlled by its government and doled out to the citizens as the Dear Leader sees fit, like North Korea. Even if, as I suspect will happen, the Liberals do not oppose the filter, I will still preference Labor behind Liberal on the ballot sheet, because the AUTHORS of this excrescence need to be made aware of how evil it is … through a period of purgatory on the opposition benches (and in some cases, unemployment), and a growing awareness of how powerless a Labor opposition would be if a Liberal Government decided just before the election that the ACTU website, for instance, constituted a clear and present danger to the nation.
If the citizenry of a nation allow politicians the right to secretly shut off information from them, it is always a descent from there, and it is very hard to get that freedom back once it has been taken away. Each successive government will use the filter for their own purposes, and whenever an election is likely to be tight, greater and greater abuses will occur. The Internet is a far greater source of information than any other in history, including newpapers, radio and television, and it needs to be available to every citizen of free nations.
Make no mistake, I will continue to fight this legislation even if it becomes law. I will take whatever steps are necessary to maintain a free internet access for myself, and if I’m able to, I will join in efforts to break the filter. I will feel not only that I have a right to do so, but that I have a duty as a citizen to do so. I’m usually a person who believes in obeying the law, but if politicians get it as wrong as Senator Conroy has here, a moral duty to the central principles my country stands for over-rides my civic duty to obey the law. I would hope that I would have had the courage to do the same thing when East Germany passed laws requiring its citizens to inform on family members, and when Nazi Germany required citizens of Occupied France to turn in Jews. I hesitate in making comparisons like those, but this law is that important: it is a small but clear step in undermining democracy in this country. It takes an essential right of free citizens (the right to access information free of the hindrance of government) away from Australian citizens and gives it to politicians instead, while also making them completely unaccountable for how they deal with this power.
Kill this appalling legislation.
I know that you’ve probably seen the news of auDA speedy takedown of a satirical website http://www.stephen-conroy.com.au following a complaint by an unnamed source, as it’s making the rounds on twitter, but when you combine that with, among numerous others,:
The fact that this policy was introduced a mere five days before the election to no fanfare or real publicity – meaning that voters interested in the topic would have presumed the policy remained the same as in 2006, where the filter was entirely optional – and has since been treated as if it were campaigned on the entire time
The constantly changing nature of the policy – opt-in, opt-out, mandatory prohibited and other offensive content, prohibited, RC and other unwanted content, RC illegal, RC – seemingly due to Senator Conroy’s constant, shall we say, confusion over its scope
Senator Conroy’s constant misrepresentations as to what content the various classification categories include
Senator Conroy’s attempts to re-write history by claiming that the policy has always been about refused classification content
The DBCDE’s prior attempt to silence Mark Newton by pressuring his industry body and employer
The preferential treatment of the extremist, unrepresentative fringe-group, Australian Christian Lobby, as a key stake-holder and their subsequent briefing on the trial pre-release
The failure to include on the draft plaform, or apparently even debate, the policy at this years’ national conference – and its subsequent reapperance on the final document
The way substantial dissent within the ALP – including a motion by the Brisbane Regional Conference to abandon the proposal and the public objection of several youth – has apparently been ignored or silenced
I think you can understand why there is zero faith, not only that this government won’t abuse a filter for political or other ends, but that future governments won’t abuse it too.
Here is a great example of Government controlled mandatory Internet Filtering. http://www.overclockers.com.au/image.php?pic=images/newspics/11dec9/18.jpg
Slightly off topic, but I found it interesting this particular blog post of the Senator’s has generated roughly 1250% more comments than any other posting in the last six months.
Acknowledging that happy people generally dont leave messages of gratitude compared to unhappy people complaining and even fewer actually inform the source of their dissatisfaction, just goes to show how many people are against this proposal and are hopefully willing to do something about it.
Use your feet and votes people!
Pia,
according to this site, under Kim Beazley, the ALP’s internet filter policy included an opt-out option. When did this change?
http://web.archive.org/web/20060422120043/http://www.alp.org.au/media/0306/msloo210.php
Pia, in December 2007, Conroy also said there would be an opt-out option (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/31/2129471.htm). Again, when did the policy change?
Ms Lundy, your hypocrisy ceases to amaze me. Today, you took on Tony Abbott’s stupid idea on enforcing bible studies. With your statement -
“Mr Abbott wants to take the choice away from parents and force every kid in every school to study the Bible”.
With your recent support for the internet filter. One could easily modify your statement to reflect your now completely hypocritical view -
“Ms Lundy wants to take the choice away from Australians and force every Australian on every computer to use the filter.”
Care to respond?
Quote: Mark M, that ABC site you linked to is now showing “Page Not Found”. Is the ABC destroying evidence?
try this one
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/31/2129471.htm
he says :
“Senator Conroy says anyone wanting uncensored access to the internet will have to opt out of the service.”
Rumor has it that Comrade Kate Lundy has changed her position on the filter, again! What’s that saying? “Fool me once, shame on you, but fool me twice, shame on me!”.
PS. I wonder if this post will be filtered (like my others)?
Dear Senator
This internet filter is pure censorship, regardless of how the government wants to spin it.
As a technological approach it will do nothing to stop people with a little bit of knowledge to circumvent the filter and obtain the content that they wish to see.
I agree that there are some things that shouldn’t be seen like kiddy porn. But there are valid things that will be blocked because a moral minority will object to, subjects that deserve discussion like euthenasia. If gay rights had not advanced to where they are now, I’m sure those sites would also be included in the Refused Classification list.
You say we should trust the government to administer the RC list, but why should we trust this government, let alone any future government with such rights to determine what we are allowed to see?
If this white elephant gets forced through, I hope that the government takes out some form of insurance on the servers that will be doing the filtering.
I am certain that the criminal and foreign national interests on the net would look at those servers as the keys to the untold riches of Australia, as all the electronic purchases and transactions will go through those servers, as will all the multinational business information of companies. Even if they were not able to gain control of the boxes, a DOS attack of enough size at the right time would stop all traffic from entering or leaving.
But it may not even take that to cause it to be embarrassing. As someone who has worked in the public service in IT for nearly 10 years, I know how smoothly projects do not run, especially those of a complex nature that this is sure to be.
As a more intelligent member of parliament who has a better grasp of the technology involved and the infeasibility and the ramifications of this, please change you stance and oppose this filter.
Regards
Chris T
To circumvent the filter will only require close to zero knowledge, as one will only have to download a firefox addon. The whole process will only take about 30 seconds, even a five year old child could do it
Hi all,
Senator Lundy has followed up from this post with a bit of a synopsis of core points from these comments, please find it here and let her/us know of anything missing.
http://www.katelundy.com.au/2009/12/21/further-thoughts-on-the-filter/
Cheers,
Pia
Office of Senator Lundy
I am so very disappointed at the ignorance and contempt the ruling bodies of this country show to its population.
Australia is a great land, but limited by the stupidity and luddite attitudes to providing the citizens high quality, low cost broadband – and now – coming up with ‘the list’, so sites we never heard about will never be found.
These pro-filter arguments lack ANY merit. We are being lied to, fed it down our throats, pontificated to from podiums and with NO evidence.
What the hell is going on?
Capitalism a love story makes for hilarious viewing when you ask the question ‘how did the people let them take $700 billion with a don’t ask don’t tell policy?’
Simple; as a financial presenter recently told me ‘Just do whatever the f**k you want’.
And you know what.. that’s what happening. People be damned, logic be damned, hears a pack of lies and misguided rhetoric “we’re taking your internet”.
I would like to say “I’m not angry, I’m just very disappointed” but I am angry, I want to fight this, for my children – so that at the very last, when our food standards that lag behind European carcinogen exclusions don’t appear in search results, when a vast array of harm minimisation information related to illict substances is removed from the access of our young people, when the American aligned cross-border media policies gain enough commercial weight to take a hand in it all…
What the hell do you mean “You will support the party position”?
Don’t you see? Don’t you have to look children in the eyes and read these comments? And what about the other senators, have they seriously not heard the people? Or are they too out of step to care?
“I will be bound by Labor Caucus’ position”
Then why bother being a representative of the people?
We cannot build a better future, an environmentally sound, safe environment for all, ideally based on equitable resource distribution, if the very first foundations of Australias emergence into the information superhighway is made by stupid, fear based politicians.
I say emergence because from what I can tell, broadband is not adequate for the majority of the population, we are NOT there yet –
Lets just burn some coal hey? Or dig it up and sell it.
Join in the chant dear reader, but don’t say it unless you mean it for the people – and by that I mean believe in a free internet.
Aussie Aussie Aussie OI OI OI.
***
To Mr Conroy:
If we the people make up this country, and the progress of our society and tax dollars is brought into question, your actions define you as an enemy of the land.
This ignorance and its effect on our future cannot – must not – stand.
Aussie, the new China, the new Saudi, the new Iran… UK next
Kate & Pia:
I find that nothing focuses the ind like a few good examples. So like and interested citizen Ive asked these questions of the Department. I was wondering if you would like to comment (or even ask Stephen when you see him in the corridor) ?
I understand that the filter will be blocking ‘unsavory’ things. I assume this will also include the standard news services, especially when there is a particularly gruesome event. E.g. thousands of bodies during the Tsunami.
With the emphasis on drugs and sex, will these services (BBC, ABC) also be blocked when drugs are integral or mentioned as part of a story. E.g. celebrity deaths due to drug over doses or news stories such as Tiger woods.
Will the specific story be blocked ? and will its associated stories also be blocked? or if the service is less reputable, such as Al Jesira, will it all be blocked?
Looking forward to your reply:)
Pia:
Sorry to lumber you with all this and so close to Christmas. Actually it was Stephen that dumped (i just did a miss type and put in ‘duped’, amazing isn’t it) it all on us at this time and left it for you to reply and us to be indignant.
I hear that he has great concern for families, and quality of life. It looks like he blew it with this as well.. I’ll give you a Christmas rest (unlike dear Stephen) and return after Christmas.. be assured we will return.
All the best to you Pia and Kate.
Happy Christmas
I have no intention of remarking on the way Senator Lundy should vote, that is a matter between her and her conscience. My only form of redress is at the ballot box in the next election.
I have no idea what the actual numbers are in favour and against this proposal, I have seen contradictory statements in various blogs and forums I simply want to make the following comments.
What I would like to draw attention to are several statements that a Voluntary filter would be acceptable.
Many times it has been asserted among other things that a Mandatory filter would :-
1. Be expensive to put into effect.
2. Be unable to achieve its aims.
3. Be a burden which could cripple the smaller Internet Service Providers.
4. Lead parents into a false sense of security.
Surely all of these would apply equally to a Voluntary filter in which case the response to any suggestion of Voluntary filtering should be a resounding NO.
In addition consider that after installation, a Voluntary system could easily be converted to Compulsory.
Whoever it is that has such a strong desire to censor the net would not be above raising the issue again and this tiresome battle would have to be fought all over again and from a somewhat weakened position. I.e. Several of the current reasons for opposition would have been removed.
Probably the only one remaining would be that of opposition to the unwarranted censorship proposed, this opposition does not appear to carry much weight with some of our elected “Servants of the public”.
May I also say that anyone who cannot see that this form of censorship could be misused in the future is somewhat naïve, I believe it sets a dangerous precedent.
I also think a lot of time is being wasted on what the exact wording has been prior and subsequent to the election.
Surely what is relevant is the CURRENT wishes of the public.
I have long felt that politicians idea of what is a mandate and mine are poles apart.
Most elections are decided on the major issues and for politicians to claim they were given a mandate to carry out things which were not key issues in the election is to say the least somewhat suspect.
In the case of the last election I was focussed on two things, industrial relations and Howard’s apparent intention to impose nuclear power generation on us. Censorship of the net did not enter into my considerations at that time and I most certainly did not intend to give anyone the power to impose it.
In passing Mr Howard was a past master of the assumption of Mandates and this was one of the reasons I could not vote Liberal as long as he led the party.
So if, after reading the above there is any doubt in anyone’s mind as to my position on the proposition, I am totally against it in ANY form.
With the exception of the “false sense of security” aspect (which I agree with), I don’t see the other issues as being a problem as such.
First off, it’s far easier to drop a voluntary scheme than make it voluntary compulsory. Just look at Net Alert.
Secondly, an opt-in or opt-out filter at the ISP level running under realistic conditions (rather than the largely artificial conditions of the Enex TestLabs study) would constitute definitive proof of its efficacy or otherwise.
What I find curious is not that people like your good self are against optional ISP-level filtering, but that Senator Conroy is. It seems to me to be an admission that if you really did have the two systems running side-by-side, the filtered feed would not be an attractive option. All the more reason to try it, if you ask me.
Finally, let me give you a little insight into the psychology of modern parenting.
I am a parent of young children. While I probably wouldn’t opt into ISP-level filtering myself (I prefer to vet web sites myself and supervise Internet access), I appreciate the sentiment. I do care about my childrens’ safety, and to that end, I like the idea of the option of an ISP-managed filtered proxy being available should it ever be shown to be effective.
Deep down, parents such as myself want to be empowered, not pre-empted. Optional ISP-level filtering is empowering, even if I never use it. Mandatory filtering insults my intelligence and my parenting skills.
Hi Kate & Pia
I will be putting any party that supports the filter last on my ballot. (I’ve previously voted Labor & Green.)
Cheers
Myles
If I could sum up my feelings in a single word about the persistence of the ALP to push forward with this Broadband Filtering farce it would be “Betrayal”.
I would support a filter if it was opt in or out. The filter now appears to have a hidden agenda because it is well established that anyone can type “bypass internet filter” into google and get a web proxy to render an internet filter utterly useless. Or perhaps the more savvy will just get a VPN and not be hindered at all.
Of course when NBN becomes a reality (Sometime between now and when hell freezes over I imagine) it will be the laughing stock of the world. So new faster 100Mbit connection that can never achieve its potential because of a utterly useless filter bottleneck. The taxpayer will pay for this privelege also, both in the filter that they have no choice in and the resulting lag infested, bottlenecked joke of a broadband connection.
Please explain how the censoring of the internet is in ANY way reflective of the values that the ALP touts on its website
http://www.alp.org.au/about/values.php
I am not a religious man but I am praying for double dissolution so the people can vote with their conscience and not some hidden political agenda.
This is Australia NOT the Peoples Democratic Republic of Australia.
Oh representative democracy I knew you well….
Actually Kate, you are not, as a member of parliament, mandated to follow caucus’s decision on this or any other matter. The constitution makes no mention of political parties and your claim to be bound by the party’s position is cowardice in the extreme.
You have written a thorough piece here, although I agree with those who dispute the mandatory nature of the pre-election promise. It is extremely clear that you disagree with the policy yet you intend to vote for it anyway? Just another reason why the major parties are out of touch.
Its called crossing the floor, Kate, and it might just make you a lightning rod for dissent and a figurehead capable of rallying the other members of party opposed to the policy. You could actually stop it happening if you had the guts, Kate!
Dear Senator Lundy,
Although I am not a resident of the ACT, I beg you to stand up for your beliefs on this matter.
If that means crossing the floor, in defiance of your Party, then so be it.
NOBODY has the Constitutional right to prevent you from doing so, not even your Party Whip, nor your Party Leader, nor your Caucus. In fact, it is illegal for ANY of them to compel you to vote against your convictions.
http://austlii.law.uts.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca191482/s28.html
CRIMES ACT 1914 – SECT 28
Any person who, by violence or by threats or intimidation of any kind, hinders or interferes with the free exercise or performance, by any other person, of any political right or duty, shall be guilty of an offence.
Penalty: Imprisonment for 3 years.
Your actions, Senator – whatever they may be – WILL BE REMEMBERED.
Senator, firstly thank you for taking the time to put forth your views.
Secondly, I plead with you to stand for your constituency (the people of Australia), and your own conscience, and not the labor party. YOU were voted in, not labor.
To me this is the most DANGEROUS and single-most IMPORTANT policy that will alter the democratic landscape of Australia. Ministers now say that they will not block “political” content. But can you say, hand on heart, and garuantee that this immense mechanism for propoganda (blocking content at will, without publishing details of it) will not be misused by a future Government? Of course not.
What an immense risk it will put average Australians under. At our very nature we are all human, and thus subject to flaw; pride and self-interest. Would John Howard have been tempted to block all references to Tampa if this existed back then? I’m sure the temptation would have been there.
No one can say that the future will hold, and how future Governments will act. Providing this tool is giving ANY Government too much power; when the difference between a democracy and a dictatoryship are a few hundred URLs.
IN the very least, if you must support this bill, please ensure that there are NUMEROUS, ROCK-SOLID protections. For example, listing of all websites blocked (except for kiddy porn etc which would be counter-productive) publically, a right of appeal on blocked content (before the courts).
However, any Government which tries to bring this in will find me voting against them in Federal and State. Never have I heard a more objectionable policy.
Ok, I am going to be an apologist for Kate and Labor, but not for the lame filter, but for the Parliamentary system.
While people are saying that the constitution does not have anything about political parties and loyalties, the constitution also leaves out a lot of stuff. Like the Prime Minister. The only reference is a “Council of Ministers” who advise the Monarch through the Governor General. It was framed by the British and Australian designers that it will be up to the Parliament itself to determine the form it takes.
Australia traditionally has a stronger party system than the USA. Compare the situation when one party controls both houses, like the Howard last term and the current Obama Presidency.
Howard was able to force through “Work Choices” quite easily, as he expected members to follow party lines. Only on politically explosive issues would he ever allow conscious votes where each member was allowed to vote as he or she saw fit.
Obama however has to treat EVERY bit of legislation as a conscious votes, and he can not guarantee core party platform items like health reform to be passed due to members of his own party.
The stronger political party system makes it more certain to pass policy into legislation, even bad ones (like Work Choices).
Unfortunately for the opponents of Filtering, it means that people like Kate who disagree with the policy has to follow it anyway.
Kate’s job as to be an advocate within government, lobbying against the filter in terms that other politicians understand (I would get my Sir Humphrey on and say the decision would be “Courageous”, which means it will lose the election compared to “brave” that would only lose votes).
This is all pointless. She’s not going to read this thread any more than she’s going to take notice of what any of us say or think. Clearly, Kate Lundy is in politics just for herself. I’ll guarantee that she will not change her view on this as she has no spine and is just a coward. The only people who can change this is ourselves. We must vote this bunch of pretenders out next time around!
Mr Owen, that attack was uncalled for. Some of us are disappointed that Senator Lundy intends to conform to party lines on this issue. We all hope she is working within the party confines to try to overturn this bizarre filter policy. However, attacking our best placed and most sympathetic politician is self defeating as well as rude.
It’s a brave thing to have an open blog like this. You should not use it for unthinking abuse.
AA, while Mr Owen’s expression is strong, his reasoning for criticising Senator Lundy’s present position of supporting the ISP level censorship scheme on the basis of party unity alone is sound and as such is hardly ‘uncalled for.’
Senator Lundy is on record, in this very blog, in her post from 2003, where she criticises a Coalition proposal for ISP level filtering as ‘ridiculous’ and ‘absurd.’ She was right.
Senator Lundy now insists that she will support the Labor Caucus position on ISP level censorship, against all available evidence that it will be without any beneficial effect, certainly will not accomplish any claimed end of protecting children- and will do so at significant cost to the taxpayer.
Indeed, given the Labor Party’s standing rules that crossing the floor is cause for expulsion from the party, it would most definitely require ‘spine,’ bravery and a demonstrable lack of self-interest for any Labor politician to oppose the proposed legislation.
Your “hope [Senator Lundy] is working within the party confines to try to overturn this bizarre filter policy” is indeed just hope. You presume a goodwill on the part of Senator Lundy towards the overwhelmingly anti-censorship electorate, which she has yet to demonstrate.
However, I can understand why Lundy has not yet come out with guns blazing against Labor’s proposed scheme. We don’t yet know what the Liberal Party’s position on the censorship scheme will be. If the Liberals do support the scheme, it would be fruitless for Senator Lundy to oppose it, at the cost of her seat.
While Lundy may be working in the background within the Labor Party to persuade the powers that be in Caucus that ISP level censorship is both unworkable and is ballot box poison, neither you, I nor Mr Owen know this with any certainty. The mere fact that Labor have mooted this policy is enough to support a cynical, albeit reasonable view (such as Steve Owen’s) that Labor politicians are pursuing a self-interested position of preservation of their seats in driving this bad policy. Mr Owen’s language, while strongly critical of Senator Lundy’s to-date failure to openly oppose the scheme, does serve to reinforce with Senator Lundy the strong opposition of voters to the plan.
Mind you, were I the good Senator Lundy, I’d also be waiting to see where the Liberals’ support of this issue will fall. In my capacity as a voter and potential entrepreneur, I’m also biding my time. If down the track, it appears as though the measure will be passed (which will require support of some or all of the Liberals), I’ll be building up a VPN service with termination in the USA for resale, with the intent of circumventing the filtering scheme- it will have a strong possibility of business success, given the broad-based and vehement opposition to ISP level censorshp within the Australian electorate.
The need to take personal responsibility is at the base of this discussion.
Responsibility to care for the well-being of our children, through active involvement in their education and their access to the world through the Internet, and not rely on false Governmental platitudes of security.
Responsibility to accept the right to be fully informed, and not just accept a sanitised “filtered” version of the truth, as dictated by a biased panel of 11 censors.
Responsibility to speak out when barriers to personal choice are being imposed by a State that believes that it “knows better” than the populace.
Clearly you Kate, Stephen Conroy, and the others behind this stupid scheme, will be fully responsible too, when you are voted out of Office by the responsible thinking citizens of Australia at the next opportunity for democratic process.
I think it’s a mistake to see this primarily as personal responsibility.
For sure, as a parent, the safety and welfare of my children is my responsibility. However, our country has a strong history of providing services that people can access to assist them in all aspects of life, safety and welfare being one such aspect.
It is not unreasonable for parents to request assistance, which is why, contrary to what Senator Conroy seems to think, Net Alert was a damn good idea. Senator Conroy declared it a failure without doing any research whatsoever into why fewer families took it up than expected. This, in conjunction with his remarks on the Enex report, gives you the strong impression that “success” is defined as “whatever we do”, and “failure” is defined as “whatever the other side of politics did”. Naturally, neither side of politics is immune to this thinking.
If the currently non-existent evidence shows that the problem was that families were prevented from accessing this service because of a lack of technical skills, then ISP-level opt-in filtered feeds, which is what Labor actually promised last election, is the next logical step, and one that is worth trying.
(I do understand and share the concern that it might provide a false sense of security, but if we are truly consistent about evidence-based public policy, we should test this claim rather than accept it blindly without evidence.)
I firmly believe that it is a huge mistake to frame debate in terms of personal responsibility. That is the surest way to lose to the powerful lobbies who are pushing for mandatory filtering.
You must speak in terms of empowering parents with tools that are effective in addressing real concerns, and in terms of sound evidence-based public policy. An opt-in filter is, at least in theory, a tool empowers parents, and also provides us a clean way out should the technology be shown to be ineffective. A mandatory filter disempowers parents, because the decision about what my children are allowed to see is taken out of my hands, and furthermore locks the nation into a technology which has not been shown to be effective.
Thank you for this comment Pseudonym and thanks again to all those who have contributed constructively to this discussion. The input is extremely valuable.
Cheers,
Pia
Office of Senator Lundy
Kate,
I feel that it is impossible for me to continue supporting the ALP should mandatory filtering take place. I understand that the goals of this filter may be noble, but the opportunity it creates for censorship the likes of that seen in China and Iran scares me. Right now there is no intention of suppressing information for political or financial gain, but in the future, will all politicians and “those in power” when it comes to this black list have noble ideas at heart when they could quite easily block something that will tarnish their reputation?
I would support your proposal simply because it is better than nothing, but I truly believe that this filter should not take place, ever.
Why don’t you simply advocate that the filter be mandatory for ISP’s to have and ‘opt in’ for people that want it? Solves the problem!
I can understand why Senator Lundy remains concerned by the policy, but the fact that it has been kept very tightly constrained to the RC content and to identified page addresses (i.e. it is not a filter it is a page blocker) means that it shouldn’t be thought of as imposing a limit on the “freedom of the Internet”.
More importantly though, if the Senator believes RC content should be available through the easy online navigation that is a webpage for adults who choose to “opt-in”, why should the same content be denied to adults in other media.
The policy of refusing access to RC content is a child protection policy not because it aims to help prevent children (or others) from SEEING it, but to help protect children (and others) from being subject to the ACTIONS portrayed in the content.
Verity, Refused Classification is not where it started. Senator Conroy initially wished to ban all “unwanted” content. Only public outcry has forced him back, first to “prohibited content” and then to “Refused Classification”. As soon as he gets his filter, he’ll change it to whatever he likes. We do not believe that it is safe or in the best interests of Australians, be they adults, or future adults (otherwise known as children), to give this power to Senator Conroy and like-minded individuals. Even Refused Classification is too broad as it contains politically banned topics such as euthanasia and drug use. It is not safe to cede our right to discuss such topics to the whims of faceless bureaucrats. If anything, we should be demanding an end to attempts to control our thoughts using legislation. Do you accept that Senator Conroy and his bureaucrats are automatically morally superior to the rest of us, and hence should decide what we can see or say?
Another important point is that the internet is not “media” in the same way as a film at the cinema. The internet is primarily a communication medium and should be treated the same way as the telephone, not as a book or film. Do you expect Senator Conroy to install a filter on your telephone to prohibit you from having certain conversations? I don’t. You must be aware that telephones are used to discuss criminal plans and banned concepts, right? Surely we should tackle the unrestricted nature of telephones next. Could it be that it’s pointless? Invasive? Technically impossible? Exactly the same as his current proposal then?
And finally, Refused Classification really is exclusively about preventing people seeing things. Blocking an image does not cause the action contained in it to be prevented or undone. That is wishful thinking of a seriously distorted kind. Assuming you wish to prevent children being subject to abuse, you should be in favour of increasing funding for policing, which continues to produce concrete results in this area. Senator Conroy would save more children from abuse (that is, greater than zero) if he allocated the entire filtering funding to police work. He has apparently decided that the opposite way (taking money off police to give to censors) is more useful to him.
We who oppose the filter are not trying to harm children as some irrational opponents suggest. Everything about the filter is harmful to children, by taking money from services that help children, by fooling people into thinking the internet is child safe, by limiting the kind of things that these proto-adults may see, read or write in the future. Senator Conroy is working directly against the interests of all of us and he should be stopped.
Verity, I understand your concerns.
The reality is that most RC content is legal to own and view in Australia. It includes such material as video games that would be rated “R”, and art films which are perfectly legal in most developed countries, such as “Salo” and “Ken Park”. The material that you are referring to, the stuff that is objectionable by any standards, is already illegal to create, own and view privately.
What you seem to be referring to is child pornography. Child pornography is, to a first approximation, not available on the open Internet. This is not surprising, because it is not legal in pretty much every jurisdiction. Rather, it is privately traded between perpetrators over private virtual networks using peer-to-peer and other such technologies.
The technical details are unimportant. What’s critical for this discussion is that this illegal trade will not be affected at all by the proposed filtering regime, because there is essentially no open web site where you can find it today.
If we ever did find such a web site, surely the only morally correct response is to shut it down and arrest everyone involved with it! Australian law enforcement services are doing an excellent job with this in conjunction with police in other countries, but I’m sure they could do with even more resources in this area.
One last thing: Australia already has a classification regime that treats identical material differently, depending on what form of media that material takes. The most obvious example is that a lot of material would be perfectly okay in a movie, but is refused classification in Australia if it happens to be in a video game. A movie such as “Salo” or “Ken Park” is perfectly legal to own and view in Australia. One may ask why it should be illegal just because your legal copy happens to sit on a server.
But even more than this, the proposal is that the blacklist will be secret. This is unprecedented. The OFLC’s classification decisions are made in the open. In the interest of accountability and openness, it maintains a freely accessible database of all of its decisions. Why should this be any different, just because the material is a web site rather than a magazine or DVD?
In short, I completely agree with you that there is a serious problem that needs to be addressed, but an unworkable non-solution is worse than no solution at all.
The entire ISP level policy never had anything to do with protecting the children, rather it was simply used as an excuse to attack the former governments policy.
Just playing politics at the expense of people civil liberties.
Clinton condemns Internet censorship
WASHINGTON, Thu Jan 21, 2010 12:33pm EST
HILLARY CLINTON: “Countries that restrict free access to information or violate the basic rights of Internet users risk walling themselves off from the progress of the next century.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60K4R820100121
What an exhilating speech by Hillary Clinton – at last, a politician who GETS IT … or at least has speechwriters who do.
“And censorship should not be in any way accepted by any company from anywhere.”
“Some countries have erected electronic barriers that prevent their people from accessing portions of the world’s networks. They have expunged words, names and phrases from search engine results. They have violated the privacy of citizens who engage in nonviolent political speech. These actions contravene the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, which tells us that all people have the right ‘to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.’ With the spread of these restrictive practices, a new information curtain is descending across much of the world.”
This should be compulsory reading for every Australian politician considering Senator Conroy’s attempt to follow China, Saudi Arabia and North Korea’s lead behind that curtain.
a mandatory filter on internet feeds accessed by children might be OK but I am 61 years old and i’m mad as hell.
treat me like a child and you’d better watch out for one hell of a tantrum.
I am an independent, clear thinking and intelligent adult who has been working with computers since before either the internet or the www and can see the stupidity of what you propose. keep your bloody naive moralism of my desktop.
I have to say that I really think it is absolutely outrageous what the government is attempting to do with this internet filtering. I, for one, am completely opposed to it. My children are now adults but even if they were small I would oppose it. I don’t need the government deciding what I can look at or not look at on the internet.
The way the government these days just makes a decision and then goes blindly ahead with it, overriding expert’s opinions, people’s wants and basic common sense, all with an attitude of “we know best for you” is what is making a lot of people very mad these days.
For anyone who references this blog the Labor party have deleted the document they issued before the last election. Looks like they don’t like being proven to be liars and scoundrels.
A google cache is still available to bypass their re-writing of history though.
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:6lNX_AlmwbgJ:www.alp.org.au/download/now/labors_plan_for_cyber_safety.pdf+labors_plan_for_cyber_safety.pdf&hl=en&gl=au&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESgMhDZDtnPmurlAEgts_XVzFXtOQTuPn0sMeaomUDL_nYq3Zuvydqp2BLcd11pjyfFfX06u_EKW28SzNzLh5w-5WA1Jb7dk72qEM6Zzg_9KeLAxETYhW6s0EQpuA19PMHidbYN_&sig=AHIEtbQJeABtLHBN4aoMZxJxxw6ztj9rGw
Labor has lost my vote.
There’s copies at:
https://broowery.com/content/labors-plan-cyber-safety-2007
and
http://machinegunkeyboard.com/ausnetcensorship/labors_plan_for_cyber_safety.pdf
There is no Memory Hole in 2010.
(h/t to Cameron Watt)
Pia,
Please tell Senator Lundy that Senator Conroy has cost labour yet another vote; and in fact he seems to be recruiting resources to ensure that your Senator Lundy becomes part of the opposition. My friends and I are spreading the message far and wide and whereever the message goes eyes open and discussion starts. This goes way beyond a couple of naughty films.
This dangerous scheme has been dreamt up by a moron, and if your Senator Lundy is blindly following this scheme, then no more needs to said. The conclusion is very clear.
Have a good day.
“I want to be very clear that ultimately, as a Senator in the Labor Government I will be bound by Labor Caucus’ position on the matter.”
I note that the constitution of Australia prevents any executive from directing how a member should vote
This is not Queensland where the constitution has been revoked without a referendum by the Brigalow Act, and where its government is currently under challenge by the High Court
How do you correctly inform your Members and Senators of your WILL? It is so simple that only laziness and indifference ON YOUR PART stops it from working. Yes, it is so very simple, and here is an example:- Suppose, for instance, you believe that income tax should be halved and sales tax completely eliminated. You write, in this case AN INDIVIDUAL letter to your Federal Member, and each one of your State Senators, such as this:-
Kate Lundy Senator
Madam,
I know that it is my duty to keep you informed of MY WILL on anything that comes before Parliament, or that should come before Parliament
IT IS MY WILL that you take immediate action to prevent internet filtering
Yours faithfully,
(signed) J Tomkins
(Insert your full name, address and date, as legal evidence that you are a constituent.)
Thankyou Senator Lundy for showing some maturity regarding this legislation. I back you 100% in your efforts to introduce the opt out clause. Thus returning Australians their rights
Here is some food for thought….
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/7054432/Terrorism-and-child-pornography-used-to-justify-surveillance-society-says-academic.html
What is interesting is that the Australian gov supports dissidents overseas in enabling them to bypass their own countries filters, but with a straight face they try to introduce on here! Even more amazing is Comrades Conroy requests to Google that they filter youtube videos and then has the hide to say “you do it for China?”
As a technologist the best way for parents to control their children’s Internet use is through a PC software filter. There a plenty of options out there, but what is the take up?
http://www.consumersearch.com/parental-control-software/best-filtering-software
There are ISP in Australia who already offer filtering services at a small premium, but again what is the take up?
I think Kates proposal for amending the Internet filter legislation is probably best thing I’ve heard in weeks.
Conroys proposal was steaming pile of brown stuff.
Really hope the amendment gets through.
Good luck Kate.
Hi Kate, Pia,
Thanks very much for engaging in this debate. It’s very important to those of us opposed to a mandatory filter that we have a champion within the government. As you’ve noticed, there have been a lot of comments on your statement “When the Rudd Labor opposition reaffirmed the policy on a mandatory internet filter prior to the 2007 federal election”. Hopefully the linked news articles and quotes from Senator Conroy have now corrected the record. In light of this, may I suggest that you add a comment at the bottom of your original post with a correction?
Cheers,
Paul
No more comments allowed? Or is Kate filtering “refused posts” that don’t tow the line?
IMHO This is all a ruse by Kate and Co. to try and show there is some sort of debate within the party, when in fact there is none.
Look at Conroy’s latest statement:-
Stephen Conroy sticks with porn filter plan
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/stephen-conroy-sticks-with-porn-filter-plan/story-e6frg6nf-1225834057002
wake up sheeple!
Hi Ivan,
Why do you think there are no more comments allowed? Your comment from only yesterday has already been moderated. We use the default first-poster WordPress moderation and as well as moderation on comments with specific words or links, and we usually get queued comments through within 12 hours, except for a select few that end up in the SPAM queue which I only check every few days.
We have been very open about allowing pretty much all posts on this blog, and we welcome all constructive input to the discussion.
Cheers,
Pia
Office of Senator Lundy
Which, Ivan, is why I have, by and large, stopped interacting with Conroy, he simply ignores everything, except for what he wants hear (its in his nature).
I am actively campaigning (user groups, churches, other influencers, email campaigns) for people to not vote for a party that can even consider an idea such as this. Unsuprisingly, once I get people think on this issue for a minute or two (the concepts are not hard), a look of horror appears and you know you have got the message across. Another room of non-Labor votes, another room full of carriers of the meme.
I have already made the case to Pia that the meme is already out there. As I see it, the only option Labor have is to sacrifice Conroy and his insanity, the earlier, the better.
The basic message to Labor is simple, Conroy and co. can do what they like (notice that I did not say Rudd and co.), come the election it will all be a mute point (And yes I was an Labor supporter until Conroy performed his black magic).
Here is a timely example of so called community engagement.
In the email mistakenly sent to the ABC, the minister’s office reveals a plan to block the Windsor Hotel development after staging fake community consultation
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/25/2830415.htm?section=justin
One wonders whether this debate is futile, as Conroy stance is firm.
I think it’s a forgone conclusion that the government will pursue mandatory filtering. Our only hopeis to engage the Liberals, Fielding and Xenophon to stop this in the Senate.
Conroy’s website removes references to filter
http://www.news.com.au/technology/conroys-website-removes-references-to-filter/story-e6frfro0-1225834474153
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1391908#r1
Some great debate on the whirlpool forums in relation to this subject.
QUOTE:
“Any body capable of critical thinking realises that laws only stop the lawful, criminals will continue to be criminals because its what they do. so new laws do not effect them.
By mandating a filter system nothing will change. Criminals will simply sidestep the filters.
In Conroys case he says he is about protecting the children and blocking paedophile sites amongst other refused classification sites. Clearly this wont effect paedophiles, at least the organised ones, the rest get caught by their own stupidity anyway.
Conroy understands this, he is by no means stupid.
So the question remains, what is the real purpose of the filter. What is the hidden agenda?
Personally I believe its primarily about kowtowing to big media.
But the filter network also gives the government the unprecedented ability to spy on most communications.
In the future the majority of our communications will be network based. from banking to personal phone calls.
If the government forces every ISP to have the hardware necessary to eavesdrop (full packet inspection) then they have achieved their goal with minimal cost and maximum efficacy.
Don’t forget the labour governments of past. Remember the Australia card an internal passport. Has the government forgotten its desire to give Australia an Orwellian future. somehow I doubt it.
So what’s your call. I have listed the ones that immediately sprung to mind, perhaps others have better insight into the real purpose of the filter.
Or do you think Conroy AKA The Labour Party is honest in his desires to see a paternal state looking after our children. We all know we are incapable of it.
oops I let that slip sorry.
Still my votes with “Protecting the profits of big media”. Because I really don’t want to believe the Australian government would deliberately bug its people. No I didn’t forget. Australia, UK and America and others monitor our international phone calls already.
Still I cant help thinking this is a foot in the door move. once done its easy to change the rules.
DC”
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1371106
Will you punish Labor at the next Federal Election if they persist with mandatory internet filtering?
Yes Votes: 10095 | 96.34%
No Votes: 381 | 3.64%
The meme rolls on, and on…
Wonder if Kevin 07 knows, or is the insulation debacle more on his mind (the one he should have asked more questions about)?
Is he asking questions about this policy farce? He should be.
You couldn’t script this better if you tried! Comrade Conroy strikes again!
SAY you’re a government minister in charge of a controversial plan to filter the internet that has been criticised for its secrecy.
Then imagine that you’re accused of obscuring access to information about that plan on your official website.
How do you respond? With the delete key, apparently.
http://blogs.news.com.au/techblog/index.php/news/comments/the_web_filter_minister_and_the_delete_key/
THE web developer whose code was modified to remove references to internet filtering on a government website has asked for it to be taken down.
“I would appreciate it if you could remove my Javascript Tag Cloud from your website,” said developer and blogger Aleks Bochniak in a letter to the office of Communications Minister Stephen Conroy.
http://www.news.com.au/technology/web-developer-asks-conroy-to-remove-script/story-e6frfro0-1225836054709
Conroy is a liability, the sooner he is relived of his duties the better.. Combine his Stalinist filter with the complete farce of the NBN and we have a winner!
Conroy denies McKinsey NBN conspiracy
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/communications/soa/Conroy-denies-McKinsey-NBN-conspiracy/0,130061791,339301458,00.htm
Is Kevin Rudd superficial and complacent?
* Yes 90.81% (1305 votes)
* No 9.19% (132 votes)
http://www.news.com.au/national/no-early-election-as-kevin-rudd-gets-jittery/story-e6frfkvr-1225836315306
I think krudd will be looking to cut him loose before the next election, or at least his advisers should be telling that!
Hello all.
I’m a few months late to this debate. However I did want to commend Kate and Pia for having the guts to lay out their position on the filter in a public forum, and then to actually invite input and discussion from all of us. The desire by politicians for actual engagement via online means, and the willingness to cop, and respond to, criticisms (as opposed to token engagement – see the Kevin 07 website for instance) is a rare and precious thing in this age of veneer politics.
This article, buried in today’s SMH, should have been front page across the country: http://www.smh.com.au/national/government-plans-to-monitor-without-court-authorisation-20100611-y3lq.html?skin=text-only
“THE federal government wants your personal internet data, and it does not want to have to apply to a court to get it.
A revelation that the federal government wants Australia’s 400-odd internet service providers to log and retain customers’ private web browsing data so law enforcement officers can access it during criminal cases has alarmed the industry.”
Is there no end to which this government won’t go?
The Labor Party has lost the plot entirely. How can you be part of this, Kate?