Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to contribute so far. I have read all the posts and have outlined some ideas as to how the policy could better reflect the original election commitment of a mandatory filter for children. I am very conscious that this direction will never satisfy those who continue to be ideologically and implacably opposed to a filter, and I respect their position. Nonetheless please understand I have responsibility as a government Senator (and member of the ALP) to make a constructive effort to address the major concerns and make the broad intentions of the policy effective in a meaningful and practical sense.
In summary, concerns raised traversed the disparity with the original election commitment and the policy released, the technical testing not reflecting the current and future network environment raising concerns about network performance impact, weaknesses of blacklist filtering creating a false sense of security, secrecy and lack of appeals and scope creep in relation to blacklist, loss of Australia’s reputation for openness and inconsistency with policy directions for ALP generally relating to the digital economy.
I take the criticism for not offering daily feedback to comments but I thought a more considered post in light of the views expressed would be a better way to express myself. Obviously, there have been some very strong opinions aired. I want to thank Pia for her contributions too!
So I wanted to start by reflecting on a key point that came up again and again: our original policy.
Our policy from 2007 was expressed as follows:
(http://www.alp.org.au/download/now/labors_plan_for_cyber_safety.pdf)
Provide a mandatory ‘clean feed’ internet service for all homes, schools and public computers that are used by Australian children. Internet Service Providers (ISPs) will filter out content that is identified as prohibited by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). The ACMA ‘blacklist’ will be made more comprehensive to ensure that children are protected from harmful and inappropriate online material.
The way it was communicated publicly included reference to a capacity for adults to ‘opt out’. For example this news story (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/31/2129471.htm) states “Senator Conroy says anyone wanting uncensored access to the internet will have to opt out of the service.”
Many people have expressed their frustration and disappointment in the ALP for announcing the final policy to be mandatory for everyone, without reference to an adult opt-out option. As one comment read: “So while the term opt-out was never explicitly used, there is more than enough ambiguity and suggestion within your fact sheet to suggest to anyone reading it that this “clean feed” would be optional, at least within certain circumstances”. Another comment says “My expectation is that Labor would deliver on their promise, which was an optional clean feed”.
In other words, there was an ambivalent reaction to the policy at the time of the election policy because it was not understood to be a mandatory filter for the general population. For example, it says “A Rudd Labor Government will require ISPs to offer a ‘clean feed’ internet service to all homes, schools and public internet points accessible by children, such as public libraries.” The key word there is ‘offer’and people are very comfortable with ISPs being required to offer a clean feed service that individuals can choose to use. This is supposed to be the how it works currently. The document goes on to say “Provide a mandatory ‘clean feed’ internet service for all homes, schools and public computers that are used by Australian children.” This was a stronger statement mandating filtering for internet connected computers accessed by children. It still does not say the whole population. Additionally people reflected on the small amount of time to absorb or analyse the policy prior to the last election because it was released just 5 days prior, so there was not a lot of time to understand, debate, clarify or discuss it to the level of detail that is possible now, hence the groundswell of interest (note the surveys showing massive discomfort with the policy).
Given the election commitment stated thus “Provide a mandatory ‘clean feed’ internet service for all homes, schools and public computers that are used by Australian children” an ‘opt-out’ for adults appears to be consistent where children are not subsequently affected by the uncensored content.
As I mentioned in my first post, an adult ‘opt-out’ is far from optimal given the potential stigma associated with it. However, the feedback is overwhelmingly that having an adult ‘opt-out’ is far preferable than not. Far preferable still was an ‘opt-in’ approach.
Another idea was put forward which caught my attention was requiring home internet users to make an active (or mandatory) ‘choice’ when they initiate their ISP account, (or at the commencement of the filtered service) either for a filtered or unfiltered service. The merit of this approach may be that of itself, making an active choice informs parents of the fact that the filter is a part of a broader policy for internet safety, and has its limitations.
To satisfy the policy objective of a mandatory filter for children, active acknowledgement that the subscriber is aware the government strongly recommends a filtered option for homes where children use the internet could be a part of this active (mandatory) choice.
I note that a great deal of concern was expressed in comments about the practical limitations of a blacklist filter and how this could mislead parents into thinking all risks were mitigated.
As I said in my previous post, my preferred approach is providing parents with a range of tools to make the right the choices for the safety of their children, so from my personal perspective, an active (mandatory) choice creates a specific opportunity of engagement for the government with parents and internet users to consider the other risks that the filter cannot address, be it peer to peer (unwanted/illegal) content sharing, cyber-bullying or identity theft.
This pro-active engagement offers government a realistic and practical platform of trust with the citizens they are trying to assist by making the internet safer by setting clear expectations if they opt-in. ISP’s could, if they assessed there was interest in the market, offer a range of filter options, again providing an informed choice for internet users.
In addition, the government is also providing a platform of trust with people who are ideologically opposed to the filter, or for other legitimate reasons such as network performance, as they could, with no stigma, effectively opt out of the filtered service.
This takes me to the next major focus of comment: the credibility of the tests on the impact of the filter on internet speeds. Concern about degradation of the performance of the internet has not been allayed by the release of the report, given my reading of the comments about the testing. There is enough specific technical concern about the filter test report that a sort of peer review is occurring. Here is a summary of some of the technical concerns raised:
- The filter test was successful in blocking 1000 URLs without a significant impact on speed, however there is widespread concern that this is not enough to allay the concerns about performance. Here are some of the technical concerns with the test:
- The scope of the trial was too limited – to block all RC content would mean blocking millions of addresses, but the trial only dealt with 1000, and even the Telstra ‘independent’ analysis only tested 10,000 URLs. For some context, there are over a trillion web pages on the Internet.
- There is serious doubt the solution can scale, and questions as to the impact on the NBN, because the trial did not test 100Mb bandwidth.
- The trial only tested static pages, not dynamic content: online content is increasingly dynamic involving much more complex filtering systems which would likely have an increased impact on the speed of service.
- Websites delivering content that is RC can continue delivering content with relative ease through changing the URL of the content, the use of peer to peer networks, VPNs, HTTPS (secure HTTP), or through many other mechanisms. So even once blocked, content can be made accessible through other means from the providers end.
- The trial report explicitly stated that “A technically competent user could, if they wished, circumvent the filtering technology.” This raises the question of whether penalties for circumvention will apply even when RC content is not accessed, including for many young people who are technologically capable. It also raises questions about what, if any penalty would be applied to individuals who circumvent, opt-out or otherwise access material on the black list, even if the material is not illegal other than it is on the blacklist.
- The risk of “false positives”: the report indicates “filtering of innocuous content” was 3.3%. This is a very large amount of content to inappropriately block once you extrapolate to the sorts of numbers that would be necessary on a blacklist. Concerns expressed included that false positives could mean Australian businesses being blocked from their customers and market, without (at this point) any clear mechanism to check, appeal or overturn the addition of their webpage to the blacklist.
- This point also relates to unintended consequences of filtering. For example in the UK where a Wikipedia page was blocked as “potentially illegal” resulting in the ability to edit Wikipedia pages being completely inaccessible to the UK (http://apcmag.com/internet_filter_stuffup_cuts_off_wikipedia.htm).
So please let me know your thoughts. I haven’t been able to reflect on everything so bear with me. and thanks again to those who have taken the time to prepare thoughtful, comprehensive contributions in particular it is helpful. Obviously I will continue to read the comments through the Christmas break and I also intend to bring these concerns to the attention of my colleagues and pursue my ideas in the new year.
UPDATE: Please note – our office is closed as of the 18th December till 4th January for the holidays.
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Hello Kate:
A yes or no with some feedback would be helpful.
Are you FOR or AGAINST a filter.
If FOR or AGAINST, why so?
Thanks,
-alex-
I rarly do a +1 on a comment, but I do need to ask this too.
In your last blog post you said that you thought it was not the best, but you also clearly stated that you would accept caucus’ ruling on how you should vote.
You are clearly aware of the points we raise enough to summarise them yet you do not state where you stand.
Do you stand behind the people of Australia who have clearly made their views known or do you stand behind Senator Conroy and the fundamental Christian far right?
Labor made a promise at the last elections and is now planning on breaking that promise. Do you care enough to realise you will lose the next election for the sake of appeasing the opinion of a corrupt caucus?
Time to grow a backbone Kate. Stand up for the views of over 95% of this country and not a minority who have somehow subjugated a senior cabinet minister.
It seems clear to me that Kate is personally against the filter, will argue within caucus against it and is listening carefully to the considered arguments below.
It’s also clear that if she fails to convince caucus, she will abide by their decision and not cross the floor to vote against it. She evidently takes a utilitarian view; that the good she can do as a member of the government outweighs the evil of sometimes having to vote for bad policy. If she were willing to destabilise her party a little she could cross the floor, and I think it would do the party good in this instance; but I don’t expect that will happen.
Many people consider this a terrible compromise and hypocrisy, but this practice of voting with a party instead of one’s conscience is the mechanism by which party politics exists at all. I don’t like it, and it’s why I don’t like party politics. But clearly Kate can live with it, and in principle I can understand why.
So the upshot is that like Martin C, if Kate fails at convincing caucus I will feel morally bound to vote against Labor and any other party or individual supporting the mandatory filter, despite my distaste for the alternatives. It’s not a pleasant situation, and the actual implementation of the mandatory filter would be catastrophic, so I really hope she succeeds.
This mentality of “you must vote with the caucus” is toxic to a democracy. Yes, you belong to a party but Austrialia and the Voters should come above party politics. If party politics works in a way that you must sell out your own ideals, sell out the voters, and sell out the country in order to even be there then what good can you truly do in parliament anyway.
I know that for Senators like Kate they are effectively voted in by the party as most people do not vote below the line. This probably makes it difficult for her, but, make no mistake, people who voted for Labor in the last election did not vote for this disturbing policy.
Kevin Rudd and Labor’s hypocrisy astounds me. I am in the group of swing votes and I know I will NEVER make the mistake of voting Labor again. I will ensure I vote below the line in the Senate so that my vote will NEVER go to Labor.
The intensely frustrating thing about the Conroy censorship issue is that we find ourselves having to lecture the LABOR party about the value of personal freedom. This is an argument I might have foreseen having to push against the God-botherers gathered at the back of the Howard government: Abetz, Abbott, Andrews, Heffernan and the other conservative dinosaurs trying to relive the 18th century. That we are now having to hope a few clear-headed thinkers in the Labor party might cross the floor to vote with the Liberals – under Abbott! – in order to prevent God-botherer censorship being imposed upon us by LABOR seriously blows the mind. The one problem I had with voting for Rudd was his religious background, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt when he implied he would not allow it to colour his leadership of the country. I feel sadly wiser now.
I for one appreciate your taking the trouble to set out the issues as you see them and having the courage to state your views. I do hope a significant number of your colleagues in the Parliamentary Labor Party, not excluding the Ministers!, take the trouble to inform themselves of the issues and implications of what is being proposed.
Kate, that’s more like it!
It’s not a policy change, but it’s certainly a welcome contribution from you to acknowledge the feedback, community expectation and prior Labor position.
I hope your colleagues are paying as much attention as you are.
At the very least, it suggests things are afoot on the Hill. I’m watching with interest.
Again, thank you for your continued engagement.
I think you’ve missed (or at least failed to emphasise) the very important point that the list is secret and there is no (or untimely and limited) mechanism for review. This proposal constitutes secret censorship – something rightly many people are very concerned about; this is the domain of draconian dictatorships.
I also think you’ve completely missed that obvious problems around edge cases involving arguably political content and the clear potential for scope creep. This includes concerns about this policy being a serious curtailment of freedom.
Senator Conroy has been very effective at muddying the waters to an extent that what exactly will be filtered (and how) is still very opaque.
This is an admirable (if somewhat incomplete) summary of the concerns expressed, but it goes no further to giving us an indication of your intended action on making a difference to this insane policy position. I’ll repeat my offer: we are a large group of very motivated people who can help you get what you need to make a difference internally. You know better than all of us how best to affect change to Government policy. Tell us what you need.
Hi Kate,
Thanks for taking the time to collate that response.
I think it covers most of the points that have been raised, it would make me feel happy to think that all of those questions/issues were going to be seriously addressed.
As I’ve said all along, if we are going to have a filter, make it opt-in. I have two young children, I have a separate PC set up in the living area where I can monitor their access and I have a client side filter installed (using a whitelist). They are far safer behind that than they will ever be behind a mandatory blacklist. I also have my own PC in the office. It is unfiltered, and only accessed by adults. If there government were to offer an opt-in filter option, I would choose not to opt-in, as I am a responsible parent who has taken consideration of the dangers of Internet access for my children.
One point that was raised several times that you did miss was the question of how many law enforcement officers could be put into action with the $50m+ per year that the filter is going to cost, and wouldn’t this be a far better option than a virtually ineffective mandatory filter?
Cheers,
Andrew.
Sen Lundy, thank you for your response. I appreciate the responsibilities of your position as Senator and Member of the ALP, and thank you for your courage in stating it as you have. I am encouraged by your honesty in continuing to respond to commentary as you have, and trust that your Parliamentary colleagues will treat the matter with as much care, and respond in as timely a fashion as you have.
Given the circumstances, best wishes for as relaxing a holiday period as you can have …
Along with many other reasons, my main reason for opposing this is because I live in Australia, and as such I expect to be living in a democracy where my word counts. Forcing the Australian public into using this filter, despite the strong opposition doesn’t sound like a democracy to me.
At the very least the Australian public should have the right to vote before a final decision is made.
Also Popular forums such as Overclockers and Whirlpool have criticised the plan as has a legal prosecutor.
Other people who are against the filter:
Senator Nick Xenophon
Senator Scott Ludlam
Mark Newton (Internode Engineer)
MP Penny Sharpe (NSW Labor Party)
MP Michael Johnson
Senator Nick Minchin
John Kaye
Helen Coonan
Kay Hull
Alex Hawke
Brendan Nelson
Cory Bernardi
Groups Against:
GetUP!
Somebody Think Of The Children
EFA
nocleanfeed
Save The Children
Alot of groups and politicians oppose it so why is it still up for legislation when going by majority, it will be voted down.
Thank You
-alex-
Kate, thanks for taking the time to read through the comments and keeping the conversation going.
Please see my comment here for the sort of environment Labor risks creating for child protection in Australia:
http://bit.ly/7G2RnK
It is in line with comments from some child protection groups. Here is an example of someone claiming to be a parent arguing that their children weren’t going to see bad stuff thanks to this mandatory filter.
I can’t find anyone who has a problem with giving adults choices that assist in education and child protection. Building new systems that are ineffective at protecting children, helping law enforcement and are by their nature secretive and poorly targeted has no place in the Australia I want my children to grow up in. It’s also not what I expect in relation to “Taking Australia forward with openness and vision”
Opt-out would be bearable but problematic not only for stigma but also if it is intended as per Labor’s 2006 policy and what I believed the 2007 policy to be then why wouldn’t most adults need to opt out? There are many things in this world that aren’t suitable for children that Adults must engage in for work, personal interest and social responsibility. If we have opt-out for child friendly Internet and it’s truly child suitable, I as a parent would need to opt in and out several times on some days (not suitable for children isn’t all about explicit sex acts).
Opt-in makes more sense. So does education for parents and teachers. The best content control tools are client installed. Senator Conroy used to ridicule the NetAlert filters because Tom Wood got around one and then pushed forward with something that is now worse for circumvention than most of the client side filters on the market today.
I’m not sure that giving away free filters to everyone was the answer either. Get it into the school curriculum more and get that process to involve parents more through the schools.
Oh and please ask Senator Conroy to stop chanting child porn like opponents to this are a bunch of deviates.
Take mandatory out of the equation.
Without any legislation involved, let ISPs offer filters on an opt-in basis if they want (Government could subsidise this for smaller ISPs who want to offer such a service but may not be able to afford it).
Government can then promote these ISPs to those who want filtered connections.
Problem solved, everyone goes home.
As long as mandatory remains in the equation, people will remain unhappy with the Government, and Australia’s image and reputation will be stained.
Couldn’t agree more. This comment hits the nature of the problem bang on.
To want to protect children is a noble cause.
To make the solution mandatory for all is draconian and undemocratic.
A democratic society is meant to be based on freedom, choice and personal responsibility!
Just to add quickly:
“This raises the question of whether penalties for circumvention will apply even when RC content is not accessed”
If Labor try to fix this mess by adding penalty for circumvention on a secretive mandatory filter of broad scope then that’s just all that more repugnant. (and completely inept and unworkable. A site can circumvent every filter by enabling https. Encryption becomes more pervasive with IPv6 rollouts. Breaking trusted environments to censor content will never be acceptable)
I’m certainly looking forward to developments as they occur, but would really like to hear what other senator/mp’s are saying/thinking. No just yourself.
Though, as previously stated, opt-in, and I’m with you. Otherwise…
Actually I think all of that is utterly irrelevant. As was your other post, and all the fancy rhetoric about protecting children and debate about opt in or opt out or the technology. Under no circumstances should we allow the Government to have in its arsenal a tool to filter websites, mandatory or otherwise.
I’m sorry Senator Lundy, but I don’t want the Government to have a tool where they can block a website. Particularly when the plan is to not tell anyone what they’ve blocked or why. The fundamental nature of our Democracy is that we don’t trust you. You need to tell us what you are up to, because you work for us.
We don’t need you to protect our children from porn – we have plenty of tools already to do that, and good ol parental supervision too. We need to protect the people of Australia from its own Government – whether that be a Labor Government, a Liberal Government, or any other flavour of Government – by not allowing such a mechanism to be put in place at all.
No filter for you. The people of Australia, who you work for, say no. Do this and we’ll fire you.
Kate,
The Government’s policy with respect to mandatory ISP filtering is currently,
“(The) Introduction of mandatory internet service provider (ISP) level filtering of content that is rated Refused Classification (RC) in order to reduce the risk of inadvertent e\
xposure.”
This policy is explicitly not about using filters to prevent criminal access to illegal material as the Government quite freely admits that such filters are easily circumvented wit\
h technical measures.
What then is the policy about? Let the words speak for themselves: “in order to inadvertent access to refused classification material”.
Does the Government have any evidence that inadvertent access to refused classification material is an actual problem? Is there any evidence that “inadvertent access” to refused cl\
assification material causes lasting harm to either the viewer of such material or to society at large?
It is not even clear that the problem the Government is trying to solve is a problem in the first place.
Deploying a heavy weight censorship mechanism that has the potential to distort the health of Australian democracy for generations is hardly a rational policy response to a problem\
that hasn’t even been demonstrated, let alone quantified.
Can you point to a single example of another Western democracy where the scope of the filter is broader than strictly illegal material?
What makes Australian citizens unique in the Western democracy that adults are not entitled to decide for themselves which legal (but refused classification) material they should b\
e able to view.
Does not the Government’s insistence on denying Australian adults this choice fly directly in the face of principle 1a) of the National Classification Code:
(a) adults should be able to read, hear and see what they want;
[ref: http://tinyurl.com/6je2d9 ]
FYI: I have annotated DBCDE’s FAQ here – http://broadbannedrevolution.blogspot.com/2009/12/commentary-on-dbcde-faq.html
jon seymour.
“Does the Government have any evidence that inadvertent access to refused classification material is an actual problem? Is there any evidence that “inadvertent access” to refused classification material causes lasting harm to either the viewer of such material or to society at large?”
This article completely demolishes any notion that media (which includes internet RC content) as any effect on the population.
The main issue is the secret nature of the blacklist.
There has been no discussion of what measures are being put in place to prevent present and future political entities from exploiting the blacklist for their own ends.
The filter doesn’t seem like it will be particularly effective in prevent child sex abuse or protecting children online and certainly will be less effective that proper supervision. It does provide some ability for parents to be accidently exposed to Adult material (which has some merit).
On the other hand having a secret blacklist on which sites can be blocked from public access sounds like a very tempting tool to be used when a government is conducting an information war on it’s own population. (something that we have seen happen many times in last decade – mostly from the previous government). I want measures in place to make sure that polical entities can’t do this and severe penalties in place if they do.
Thank you for addressing the concerns about the proposed filter.
While I would be strongly against the filter as currently proposed, I would be satisfied with an opt-out system – even if that meant having to “certify” that no minors were able to access the unfiltered service. I do think an active decision – to opt in or out – would be a good way to ensure that those who do accept the filter are informed about its limitations in actually providing protection for children.
*It does provide some ability for parents to be accidently exposed to Adult material (which has some merit).*
This sentence should read
It does provide some ability for children not to be accidently exposed to Adult material (which has some merit).
Kate still think you should vote against this. How you can bear to have Jim Wallace and his Australian Christian Lobby associated with the ALP?
Another area you have not mentioned is this filter will literally kill the online gaming community due to increased latency. Video streaming which is becoming more prevalent and will replace physical media in the future will also be effected.
For gaming you need two key factors, low latency and high upload speeds. A good example of how latency kills is Interleaving. Interleaving on connections 8Mb and above has effect on latency to the point where on ADSL1 it’s better to game at 1.5 MB then 8 and even ADSL2+ with 20MB or greater it’s recommended you ask for interleaving turned off. To add even more latency due to the filter (which was not even measured in the trials) is a show stopper.
Gaming industry is now bigger then the film and the average age of gamers is 30 in Australia. This is not a minority to be dismissed like that ALP luddite South Australian Atkinson will discover. Those people who’ve paid for steam or xbox live accounts will have wasted their money.
The 20-40 year old demographic with alot of disposable income, who voted ALP on promise of better connections for things like streaming and gaming will be looking outside of the ALP come next election. All it will take is a double disloution over ETS and the greens will get seats to counter the dodgy preference deals the ALP did to get Family First in.
Show us that ALP is not another Right wing party we already have the Liberals.
Just a reality check: The filter, as proposed (and based on existing legislation/regulations for ACMA) will not affect online gaming at all. ACMA only has the power to add very specific URLs to the blacklist (not even domains or complete websites), and no low-latency gaming protocol is based on HTTP.
Some of the concerns of gamers are quite valid, I think.
ACMA has greater scope than just urls – they’re meant to regulate all online content. They can and have imposed restrictions on content distribution services in the past. Perhaps the biggest example is iTunes, wherein ACMA forced Apple to disable the ability of Australians to gift movies to each other, because it was possible to give an MA15+ movie to a third party of unverified age. In truth, Apple actually got off lightly it was and still is selling MA15+ movies behind an ineffective age verification mechanism. That’s Prohibited.
The point of this and gaming, however, is that the iTunes situation can easily be applied to digital distribution services. Valve’s Steam, in particular, is vulnerable because it allows gifting in much the same way iTunes used to. It also sells, overseas, RC content like the uncut version of Left 4 Dead 2, and allows Australians to be gifted said content.
Sure, but those examples have nothing to do with ‘net filtering or gaming performance, and are completely kosher under current law (which you may or may not be happy with, but there it is).
The filtering proposal, as it stands, is an extension of the existing ACMA blacklist regulations/legislation which deals with complete URLs and HTTP.
Just want to make sure people are correct in their assertions about this broken policy.
http://www.internetblackout.com.au/
Jeff,
Slowing one IP packet down – whether that be a web HTTP/TCP or a UPD/TCP gaming packet – slows the entire packet flow down.
just as having even ONE (1) internet connection filtered still impacts packet flow through the entire internet – and can therefore affect many other users.
Filtering does affect latency for everyone and every protocol.
This is something everyone needs to learn.
Jeff,
As the Australian public is not informed on what sort of packet inspection will be used you can’t make this comment with any surety. In fact, the opposite is probably more true.
The tests mentioned methods that would delay each and every packet transmitted. That would add “lag” to most internet gaming. Only one of the proposed solutions wouldn’t lag a gaming session, the bulk would make most PvP MMO sessions unwinnable.
One wonders how Telstra and Apple would react to your reality check. Both were forced to stop offering R18+ movies for sale over the web by the ACMA. Surely the work around would be to just ship the movies over some protocol other than HTTP?
Thanks for your continued feedback Kate. At least SOMEONE is communicating with us.
The bottom-line, for me, is the removal of Mandatory. Make it opt-in or opt-out, I care not which, but the removal of MANDATORY filtering will appease me.
Yes, indeed. Senator Lundy is at very least paying attention to the valid objections raised by the community at large. Sen. Conroy is doing nothing of the sort; he is plainly intent upon forcing a mandatory censorship regime, for which Labor have no mandate, upon a very unwilling population, while ignoring and/or dismissing all reasonable objections.
ISP level filtering simply will not protect children. If in fact, that’s the actual goal of the exercise, Labor would not choose it, due to the demonstrable ineffectiveness of such a scheme. Parents whose children were exposed to objectionable materials which the scheme promises to block would be well within their rights to seek compensatory damages. How much will the damages claims cost, Senator Lundy?
If Labor are bound and determined to impose some sort of filtering, it must not be mandatory. It must be ‘opt-in.’
Well done, Kate. Your analysis is both thorough and, as far as my knowledge goes, technically correct.
The part about the circumvention penalty worries me though. Not everyone using a VPN would be trying to get around the filter and it’s impossible to tell. The whole point of a VPN is the P in the middle: Private. For example, many businesses and government departments deploy VPNs for users to access the office network securely when they are remote from their desks. This part really needs to be clarified.
So what’s the next move?
A quick reply regarding the issue of circumvention and the criminalization thereof:
BROADBAND, COMMUNICATIONS AND THE DIGITAL ECONOMY QUESTION NO.831
Senator Ludlam asked the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, upon notice, on 20 November 2008:
[...]
(3) What is meant by ‘provide warnings on circumvention attempts’.
(4) Does the Government propose, or is it considering, the criminalisation of circumventing or attempting to circumvent the proposed filtering regime.
——–
Senator Conroy – The answer to the honourable senator’s question is as follows:
[...]
(3) Some filter products provide a reporting mechanism to the account holder (for example the parents) of circumvention attempts made from the account. There is no intention for circumvention attempts to be reported to Government or authorities.
(4) No.
Thanks Sen.Lundy for this follow-up, collating to a significant degree the barrage of comments that the previous post generated. (it’s a pity not everybody managed a constructive and civil tone, but such is life I suppose.)
Putting the mandatory nature up for discussion seems appropriate, in line with the Labor election policy – and the side-effects of making the filter optional or selected in the ISP contract or opt-out would surely make the scheme workable/palatable for most people.
There is still the concern of the “taboo list”, but if one can opt out circumvention would I presume be a legal non-issue… e.g. one would not need to fear prosecution for circumvention in some form, since with opting out (in some form) that mode of operation would already be available. So, this greatly simplifies things and will alleviate many of the concerns.
Another key concern would remain, and that’s the slippery slope. Just like the extent of the blacklist (and its taboo nature) can easily be extended later to restrict fundamental freedoms, having filter legislation in place that is somewhat optional/opt-out initially, could be made mandatory later.
I think it’s vital to ensure that this really cannot happen, otherwise none of the other concerns is effectively covered. So that will be a critical point.
1) Helping parents deal with questionable content.
Unfortunately limiting the filter to RC content simply isn’t enough to “protect children” – making the whole exercise rather moot.
An opt-in filter should allow everything up to MA15+ content, but not beyond. This kind of filtration would actually offer parents some peace of mind.
2) Actually protecting children
Unfortunately, this still doesn’t actually PROTECT children from online predators who seek out access to the child’s webcam or personal contact/address details — only increasing the spending on policing online crime can do that.
Only education can prevent children suffering from online bullying. These are the real threats to kids on the internet.
If this policy is about protecting children then it’s important to address that correctly, rather than being bound by some ill-informed technical notion of how best to do that. A filter is at odds with protecting children.
3) Who will be filtered?
How many children are we talking about who purposefully go out of their way to look at inappropriate URLs? Blocking inappropriate URLs only achieves anything if kids are faced with a link to that website which they then make the choice of clicking.
It does nothing to prevent errant content from appearing in front of them when posted by malicious users in spaces the kids normally frequent, like myspace and facebook.
A filter serves to ‘protect’ only those who already know what RC content they’re looking for. Once frustrated by the filter, it’s a trivial matter to circumvent it via SSL-based proxies, as you’ve noted yourself.
I don’t mean this facetiously, but just about every little trouble-maker already knows how, and you can bet there will be instructions circulating facebook once the filter is enabled.
…
So I return to the most important point – #2 – if the objective of this policy is to protect children, instead of the ultimate objective simply being “to have a filter”, then the money should be spent FAR FAR more wisely.
It’s time for the powers that be to decide which part of the policy is more important – the filter part, or the protection part, because together they achieve nothing.
Thank you, Kate, for listening to the many public concerns about mandatory internet censorship.
Thousands of people, maybe millions, will be hoping that you can persuade Senator Conroy and Kevin Rudd to at least create an opt-in only service. People should have the choice. We are a democracy after all. How could we ever stand up again for human rights issues abroad if our government is practising mandatory censorship of a kind that only exists in dictatorships?
Good summary of some key issues around implementation, if not tackling the key issue of giving government power to implement secret list.
I work in the public library sector, and part of my job is writing policy on internet access and responding to public enquiries, so the question of how to empower parents is of concern to me. I’ve been toying with designing parent’s internet literacy courses libraries could run based around the most common questions, which are generally:
“How come my internet bill was $400 last month??” (With more families doing it tough, this is a rowing cause of stress to parents of teenagers who don’t understand downloads).
“Why is my daughter online ALL THE TIME?? Who is she talking to?”
“My kids watch lots of tv/movies they download. That’s legal right?”
“Should I worry about Facebook? Is there porn on YouTube?”
“My child ‘borrowed’ my credit card and hit up ebay… Can I return it?”
“I came in last week and Johnny was watching street fight videos. How can I stop that?”
Occasionally I’ve had cyber-bullying stuff – things like nasty references to kids being made on Wikipedia pages, as well as the standard Facebook/MySpace dramas. I honestly cannot remember a single question about something the mandatory filter would have blocked – although I also get questions from older kids about (mostly health) sites they can’t get at home which seem to be due to overzealous filters.
I think some basic 2-hour classes/seminars which covered an intro to Facebook/MySpace; instant messaging email and how kids content share; chat-rooms/forums and how to deal with potential predators; and peer-to-peer – legality and amount control, which finished with covering some basic tech tools to help, would be worth so much more than a filter, and designing and running a national program through the public libraries would cost much, much less.
But y’know, it wouldn’t help the far right push naked girls off the internet, so I guess it isn’t as important.
Features of the software that has been trialled, include the ability to identify any individual user, as well as providing continuous real-time reporting of user activity (whether that activity is blocked or permitted). That’s fairly normal in filtering systems, as (to be effective in any useful way) there does have to be a certain amount of daily and monthly evaluation by *somebody*.
It makes me wonder: Who is that data sent to? How is it secured? Who is permitted to examine that data?
Whoever has access to the filtering units would be in an interesting position being able to (for example) access the browsing data of any, say, Australian Senator, journalist, or other person.
That’s an intrinsic side-effect of any filtering system (I’ve worked in the industry myself, and you would scarcely credit the things that I have wished that I had not learned about people and organizations through such unavoidable exposure – enough certainly to destroy careers, and to make me glad that I am no longer in the industry).
Most any filtering expert can tell you tales about monitoring individual users Web-use. It bothers me that we haven’t heard more about that end of things.
It is important to note that it is not only technical scaling issues that must be considered. The current black list is ACMA created, and is known (based on leaks, despite the secretive process) to contain several false positives, and very odd choices (the infamous Queensland dentist). The list is also so small as to block a vanishing small percentage of the RC material on the internet. If we wish to expand the list from thousands to hundreds of thousands (which would still leave us blocking a pointlessly small percentage of material), we would need to expand the ACMA staff responsible by hundreds of people – and if we also with to keep the false positive rate down, we would need to expand it even further. The ACMA black list solution not only is secretive, undemocratic, and without adequate checks and balances – it is also impossible for it to scale to a point where it is more than a token effort.
Good on you Kate, let’s keep the discussion going. Thanks for succinctly acknowledging the many varied concerns on this topic.
I particularly like the idea of implementing a point of decision (an active choice) for the retail end-user, a chance to educate and offer the benefits of a filtered connection for those who might find it valuable.
By making the filter optional, and putting effort into education and industry support, you’d be meeting the objectives of “doing something about protecting children on the internet” while negating the genuine concerns about loss of freedom to read/write as one wishes.
This issue has the potential to be *positive* for the ALP, especially with the enormous coverage it’s getting. I think by continuing the discussion as you are, and formulating non-mandatory filter legislation, you could see all this negative energy turn positive.
Just keep the honorable Senator Conroy out of the public gaze on this. Every time he opens his mouth it’s another reason for the issue to blow up again.
warm regards and best wishes for a well-earned break,
George
I also have concerns that false positives are a very significant issue if we have genuine concerns about child sexual abuse. Those false positives, by the nature of keyword search and similar technologies, will include sexual abuse support sites and support groups, articles about the dangers of child sexual abuse, and other material that helps to mitigate the harm experienced by child sexual abuse victims. The child abuse networks already use sophisticated methods based on peer to peer networking to share banned material, and the filter will make little difference to their access (apart from ensuring that they use methods that hamper law enforcement agency surveillance), but their vulnerable victims are less likely to have the knowledge and access.
Hear hear.
The filter may negatively impact on a number of support sites, from child abuse, to rape, abortion, anorexia, and many others.
Senator Stephen Conroy has already mentioned sites about anorexia may be refused classification, as it comes under a category of harm. Given the nature of support sites, this could mean many things would be blocked.
Thank you for taking the time to review the comments. By reading, understanding and responding to the comments you have actually shown more courage than the Comms. Minister in addressing this issue.
However I must remark on my disappointment that the Labor party would use such a thin excuse as social stigma to deny Australian’s an uncensored internet. No other Western Democracy has such a mandatory requirement, despite Senator Conroy’s protests to the contrary, so does this mean that they too should be stigmatised? Or is it that Australian parents are less trustworthy than their UK or European counterparts? Perhaps we are less trustworthy still more than our US cousins in whom is entrusted an entire bill of rights.
Now that the rant is over let me suggest that you review the lack of capability of any blacklist to handle modern criminal hosting options such as are provided by fast flux networks and bot-net hosting (both of which have legal capabilities as well) as well as the end to end encryption and advances inherent within IPv6.
Also please address the concerns of the community that, despite the interest of various IT groups, the one non commercial group that was allowed access to the Minister was the Australian Christian Lobby.
Apologies about the wording and abbreviations but I have my newborn son in one arm and he screams every time I use my spare hand to type. He much prefers suckling on one knuckle.
Thank you again for your the opportunity to have our voices heard, Kate. This post in particular suggests that you have a solid understanding of our concerns and I have faith that these concerns will be communicated to Senator Conroy and others within the ALP.
Whether these concerns will be given the consideration they deserve remains to be seen, given the clear evidence to most of us that the wrong person is in charge of the communications portfolio.
Outlining the primary concerns I have with the filter:
* The government lacks a clear mandate to implement the filter. The current policy is clearly in contrast to that conveyed to the general public during the 2007 election.
* Scope creep is not only possible, but highly likely. The policy was initially based on the current ACMA prohibited content list – including MA, R and X rated content, and this was actually the blacklist that was used in the trials. There has since been a relaxation to “refused classification” content, but Senator Conroy has conceded that he will be powerless to prevent future changes to the scope of the filter. The ACL is already pushing for the list to be extended back to the full “prohibited” list, and given that it has previously been ALP policy, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that Labor itself will make such a change. That’s without even considering what future governments will do with the unprecedented control Conroy is pushing to give them.
* Even without scope creep, the blacklist contains a disturbing range of legal and relatively harmless content. This includes sexual practices of consenting adults as tame as candle wax and body piercing, video games that are considered suitable for 16-year-olds (but banned because they are unsuitable for 15-year-olds), graphic images and videos in news content that is clearly in the public interest, and detailed discussions of controversial political issues such as drug use and euthanasia. As it stands, censorship in Australia is already amongst the worst in the democratic world, and we should be moving away from such an unfortunate position rather than making it exponentially worse.
* The blacklist, by its very design, is secretive and unaccountable. We cannot independently check that no sites have been included either by mistake or due to government intervention. Given recent blacklist leaks, the presence of sites that should not be on the list is inevitable but there will be no possibility for independent scrutiny by the general public.
* It is fundamentally an invasion of privacy and a reversal of the presumption of innocence. I do not have my private mail opened, “filtered”, and checked against a government blacklist by Australia Post, and I shouldn’t expect anything similar when it comes to my internet use.
* It will be expensive, particularly for smaller ISPs, and the trial report which has just been released is at best inconclusive.
Almost every goal of the filter will end up being undermined by the counter-productive nature of the plan:
* When (not if, when) the list leaks again, the material that the government considers to be so dangerous that no member of the public should see it will be available and conveniently catalogued for billions online.
* Despite the “no silver bullet” talk, the unachievable promise that the filter will do a single thing is likely to be believed by parents who will then be less likely to take responsible action, and let their guard down, believing the problem to be fixed already (take a look at 90% of letters from “concerned parents” – they genuinely believe Labor’s plan will fix everything).
* Any diversion towards “blacklisting” the material and forgetting about it is a diversion away from legitimate law enforcement efforts to punish those responsible and remove the content at the source.
* Pushing Australia to a situation where filter circumvention is a fundamental component of learning to use the internet (as in Iran and China) will undermine efforts to tackle truly disturbing online content, and give criminals more confidence in escaping detection.
* The mandatory filter that so many parents are pushing for to keep their children safe? It currently allows graphic X-rated content. The mere presence of a mandatory filter just confuses the issue when it comes to helping parents make a reasonable and informed choice about internet filtering.
Once again – remove the word “mandatory” and almost everyone will be happy.
I’m sure I’ve missed something. The plan is so mind-bogglingly ill-informed, misguided, idioitic and reckless that it’s hard to know where to start when debunking it.
Senator Lundy thank you for making the effort to collate the opinions expressed about the proposed filter. I have been following the debate on this for well over 12 months and it has been clear to me for sometime that the vast majority of the people who oppose the filter would accept, all be it in some cases reluctantly, an opt in filter. I find it disturbing that a Government that said it would be open and consultative with the people has for the past two years done exactly the opposite. The Minister responsible has suggested those that oppose the filter are pedophiles or viewers of child pornography. An attempt was made to silence one critic by putting pressure on his employer. The Minister has failed to provide answers to questions in the Senate or has provided incomplete answers. The Minister could not even provide consistent detail of what was going to be censored. We are still lead to believe that “objectionable Material”, what ever that is, will be “filtered”. It is hardly surprising that a lot of people feel that the filter = censorship by stealth.
Your efforts are the first I have seen by a responsible Government member to clarify what you want to achieve and enter into a discussion on how to achieve this. Please keep up the good work but could you please drag Senator Conroy into the current day and age stop him making contradictory and ludicrous statements and get him to show the openness and proper consideration that you exhibit. If not could you take over please?
Very best wishes for the festive season.
Bob Harvey
Thanks for this post Kate – it shows that you understand the arguments which is incredibly valuable. It’s not clear from your post what you intend to do with this knowledge though.
Conroy’s mantra is “evidence-based”, “evidence-based”. Where is the evidence that there is a problem that needs to be solved, firstly, and secondly, a problem that this filter would address more effectively than any of the other solutions available? Yes, it would prevent accidental viewing of content that has previously been reported and reviewed to put it on to the blacklist (ie: an eternity, in terms of how long it takes to upload or move Internet content), by users who are not motivated to circumvent the filter. Client-side filters would do this far more effectively and far less intrusively, but acknowledging the suitability of a Liberal party initiative just wouldn’t do, would it?
Have a think about how and why the Internet has worked to this point, Conroy…it’s somewhat part of your job. Until then, why are we allowing ignorant politicians to direct network architecture and engineering?
Senator Lundy,
While I appreciate your continued engagement on this issue and you making some adjustment to your position based on carefully chosen sub-set of the feedback provided, you have still failed to provide the most important information of all – the statistically valid survey results showing that a majority of Australians are actually asking for the proposed Internet filtering to be implemented.
If you do not provide this information one can only assume the only reason for pushing a patently unpopular policy into law is that the Federal Government is doing so only to honour election promises made to small number of influential interest groups.
I would appreciate if you would either provide this information or explicitly state you will not provide it.
By taking this step you will show the electorate the motivation for this policy and the electorate can then make an informed decision about the policy.
Apart from the entirely anti-democratic nature of the mandatory filter and that the money Senator Conroy has spent so far should have been given to the AFP’s anti child crimes unit (which has actually made a concrete and provable difference), what particularly riles me as a parent is that the filter actively prevents me from doing my job to educate my child about anything that might be on the ACMA’s unaudited, unpublished, un-appealable blacklist. So when the time comes to tell my child about safe sex, euthanasia, abortion, and how to recognise predators or drug use (whether safe or unsafe), this filter will block everything.
Please don’t try to assure me that this won’t happen, because we all know that it will. Every single government that we’ve had has indulged in this sort of scope creep.
The “please think of the children” cry is an insult to the intelligence of the average citizen of this country. Thinking of the children requires teaching them to think for themselves, which means having un-censored access to information.
I am writing to you as well as every other senator, to the PM, Deputy PM and to my federal MP to lodge my objections to this plan.
Thanks for speaking up on this. This is the first time I’ve seen anyone from the Government admitting to the ‘bait and switch’ trick that happened.
Best of luck for the new year!
Thanks Kate,
You seem to have covered the majority of the points of contention with the policy as it stands.
I’m going to bring it back to grass roots level a bit and point out that you touch upon it a little when you speak about the ambiguity of the policy document which does not define mandatory for all Australians.
I refer to the status quo.
So currently those who see a problem have several choices available to them at the moment. One is a friendly family ISP such as Webshield. The second is client side filtering software. The third WAS Netalert however your boss decided it was a good idea to throw it in the bin at the end of last year.
A popular pro filter argument is that client side filters (I’ll throw Netalert into this category as it essentially was one) was that they were too hard to set up and didn’t work properly. I do not buy this argument for a second. EVERYONE knows at least someone with a bit of computer expertise and installing one of these filters is so easy that if you can manage to use google and play solitare on XP then you won’t have an issue.
The frustrating thing for me is that I know that the proposed mandatory filter won’t do ANYTHING more than any currently available filters won’t do, in fact it will do less and at a much higher price, not only monetary but other aspects outlined in any argument against it put forward.
The other argument was that they are too easily circumvented. Well just LOL at this one. And the proposed one won’t be? The Minister has even gone on record on a Twisted Wire radio interview stating that circumvention is trivial. The proposed one will be easier to circumvent than Netalert was and even that was reported factually incorrectly, the kid new the administrator password to the PC. Nothing was hacked, there was no clever coding or bypassing involved -he knew the password.
So now with this MANDATORY filter we will be basically advertising to parents “throw away the passwords – you don’t need them anymore. Nanny Rudd is here to watch all your kids for you so whatever supervision you were providing you don’t have to worry about it anymore. Oh and by the way, not only will we be nannying your children we’ll babysit you on the net as well.”
Which brings me to family friendly ISP’s. Has it occured to you why they are so small and have a very limited customer base? It is most certainly the same reason why Netalert was taken up by less than 1% of the population and why alot of parents don’t even use 3rd party client side filters.
Simply…..
There is no demand for it. Why attempt to change the status quo if there is nothing to change. It’s as if someone within the Labor Party has decided that there is a problem before even confirming if one actually exists then blindingly set out on a crusade to find a solution. People are happy with the exisiting situation as it is, they have a choice and the majority of them chose to use the tried and tested method of filtering called “parenting”. Common sense stuff like putting the family computer in the living area. Having a talk with children about the dangers of internet. Telling them what their boundaries are. It’s not cutting edge stuff, parenting has been around for quite some time now and hasn’t all of a sudden changed with the conception of the digital age. I should know – I grew up with it.
Let the parents make the choice – it should be clear from lack of interest that they have decided that they want to use their own methods. There is no demand, there is no problem to solve. The status quo is fine. Mark Newton has been banging his head against a brick wall saying this stuff for over a year now.
Why insult people who parent well by forcing this on to them with no choice? I know a lot of angry parents at the moment who will be voicing their opposition against this policy at the next election. Why lump this on people with no children at all as outlined in the policy document. To be fair you’ve picked up on this however I doubt this will change the policy as it currently stands.
The repeat Mantra I get is that it was an election promise and we are damn well going to deliver on an election promise. Consider for a moment that Mr Rudd’s election promise was completely different to the one the electorate voted for (If you actually include a policy drafted up 5 days prior a reflection of voter support). Where he saw mandatory we saw voluntary. Where he saw “provide without option” we saw “offer” – this extended from there to any computer used by children in which he actually meant any computer used by any Australian – child or adult. I can see where the mistake can easily be made (LOL?)
Instead of the government donating $43 million dollars (plus the millions per annum to manage and maintain) to filtering vendors my solution is this:
- Require ISP’s to voluntarily offer a family friendly clean feed to any household or business that choses to take up the offer. Award grants to those ISP’s who have people take up the offer to help offset the added costs.
- Put more money into proactive policing of Internet Crime – not only online paedaphile rings but to help combat identity theft, cyber bullying and other illegal activity. Much better than attempting to block a thousand static URL’s without success.
In a nut shell, take away the Mandatory part and honestly Kate – everyone will go home. The status quo will be maintained and there will actually be some merit in the policy.
I know it won’t go this way – it’s probably already been discussed internally within the Labor Party and the big boss won’t budge on that part, and I think I know the reason why. It would indeed be embarrasing to find out after the fact that less than 1% of Australia actually approached an ISP requesting a voluntary clean feed to their connection.
Forced compliance will not cover up a lack of demand that everyone knows exists – to argue it is pointless.
Thoughtfully,
Daniel
Wow, I have to admit, I was disappointed when i read your previous blog, but it is actually great to hear that you are actually listening to our concerns, something that most of the other labor MPs have failed to do so.
One thing that should be added to this debate is the whole issue of RC content. Stephen Conroy has said that no political content will be involved. But if this is so, why are websites on abortion, euthanasia, sites where gay people can talk about their sexuality/problems etc are being blocked?
Part of the RC content that is being blocked are sites that incite crime. Now this is a very gray area. In the leaked blacklist, a site promoting drug harm minimization (i.e. how to inject safely so that no harm can be caused and decrease HIV spread) was blocked. A youtube clip showing kids graffiting was blocked. A site which has a research paper talking about terrorism (not pro-terrorism but is about what drives/motivates these terrorists). Surely you can see that these websites are definitely not illegal.
Also the Australian Sex Party has estimated that 95% of legal pornography available on the internet will be blocked. Now I know most politicians will probably think abortion, euthanasia and normal porn is abhorrent (due to the many Christian/catholic background of politicians) but this doesn’t reflect the democratic society of Australia. The internet is a place of free speech and these things, even if they are objectionable, should not be censored. The only thing that should be censored is child porn. If the mandatory filter ONLY blocked child porn like in Germany and Italy, I’m sure there wouldn’t be much debate.
The internet is a medium which is way too complicated to be classified through system we use for TV and movies. I’m not sure if this has been referred, http://www.ecu.edu.au/pr/downloads/Untangling_The_Net.pdf
but this is a research paper conducted by Professor Catherine Lumby from the university of New South Wales which looks at the whole issue of RC content and what is likely to be blocked. It really highlights the failure of this RC system.
Personally, an opt-in would be fine to me. Although I never really thought this whole thing was necessary. I never read any news about people complaining that they stumbled across child porn, beastiality, rape etc. Stephen Conroy makes it sound as though children and adults stumble across this on a regular basis. Anyone with IT knowledge will know that you can’t just stumble across these sites, you’d have be actually go searching for them. The only thing you might stumble on is hardcore adult porn. If parents are worried, just install a program. Yes, I agree that there should be education about this. And the funding should go to the AFP as well.
Anyway, Kate, if you read this, please tell Senator Conroy that just because we are critics of this policy, it does not mean we’re paedophiles or that we support child pornography. It really makes it hard to debate with him when this is the type of rational argument he can come up with. We just believe that the internet should not be censored and his concerns of cyber-safety can be tackled with much more effective ways.
A good post, but I have to disagree on one point:
” If the mandatory filter ONLY blocked child porn like in Germany and Italy, I’m sure there wouldn’t be much debate. ”
Surely child pornography is one thing that shouldn’t need to ever be put on a blacklist. ACMA are obligated to pass such material to the police and I can’t think of a situation where putting child porn on a blacklist is better than having police investigate it, prosecute the people involved, remove the material and in some cases even rescue the abused children. Yes I know sometimes this material is hosted in the middle of nowhere, but surely no country in the world wants to be associated with such material. Getting the material removed should be as easy as contacting the authorities in the country it is hosted, or even just contacting the provider and asking if they are aware that they are hosting such material.
Unfortunately people confuse child pornography with ACMA’s definition of RC – Child Depiction (I think Senator Conroy deserves a lot of the blame for this). Presumably this catagory would include pornography involving consenting adults that are made to look young (eg pigtails and braces), cartoon type pornography where people look young ect.
In my opinion child pornography should only be added to the blacklist as a last resort and this should only be at the request of the relevent authorities
“It also raises questions about what, if any penalty would be applied to individuals who circumvent, opt-out or otherwise access material on the black list, even if the material is not illegal other than it is on the blacklist.” Bam! Another step towards the police state. Block political content, then prosecute those who want to find out about it.
Even if the current version of the government doesn’t intend to subvert the censorship to it’s own ends, can you guarantee that subsequent ones won’t? How about if any other party won majorities in both houses? Then how would you stop their increasing of the censorship?
There is not a single instance of censorship NOT being used against the citizens. Your refusal to vote against this proposal is disgraceful; indeed now you’re suggesting that we should penalise people who want uninhibited access. Goodbye democracy.
Merry Christmas Comrade.
I think you badly misread the Senator’s thoughts about criminalisation, there… pretty sure that question was indeed a thoughtful question based on the feedback received on the previous post, not a suggestion.
I stand corrected. Please excuse my ignorance (for the most part I skimmed teh article)
However even ignoring the first paragraph of my comment, can Kate please respond to the second?
Kate, for well over twenty years we’ve had an internet whose content has been uncontrolled. There’s no evidence to suggest that this has led to moral decay or the end of civilisation as we know it. I’m certain we can carry on quite well for another twenty-odd years without government oversight. And that’s what makes a filter such a senseless proposition: there’s absolutely no need for it and it’s a waste of taxpayers’ money.
Careful now Kate. If you keep “spinning” like this you’ll get dizzy, fall down, and look even sillier than you already look now.
My “Australian Filter Policy” (AFP) –
Note, the same acronym of the very organisation, Australian Federal Police (AFP), who currently, and rightly, have the job of stopping illegal content.
will be quite simple :
If Labor filters the internet, Labor no longer gets my vote at any election.
Kate,
thanks for further clarifying your position and acknowledging that there was definite confusion about mandatory versus opt in/out filtered internet as part of the ALPs election platform. As stated previously in these comments – a big issue with the proposed filter is the oversight and transparency of the blacklist – how will we know whats on it? how can people get a fair hearing to have items removed from it? especially when they don’t know their on it. It smacks of a little secret police when there is just no need for it – this is soon to be 2010 and the era of open govt and the ALP is proposing a secret filtering scheme??? Opt in or out should definitely be an option – since it would appear that additions to the filter will be subject to the social norms of quite a range of societal groups – including those with hardline religious views.
A further aspect of the debate so far that has really rankled is Senator Conroys attempts to classify those that disagree with the policy as those in favour of child molestation, if not actually perpetrating the act themselves. This was a tactic used by the Bush administration in the very worst way in their “War on Terror”. A tactic that has no place what so ever in the Australian parliament issuing from the lips of an Australia Senator – its not easily tolerated.
regards
Hi Kate,
Thanks for your follow up post – it’s great to feel listened to (unfortunately, I’ve not had quite so much luck getting anything constructive out of colleagues of yours, and Senator Conroy has totally dropped the ball in terms of consultation and communication on this issue).
As another point relating to the massive gap between community expectations vs. the reality of the proposed system as it stands, please check this post on the popular broadband discussion forum Whirlpool:
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1345700&p=4#r77
“I dont want my children to see this kind of stuff on the internet. I find it abhorrent and wrong and I get upset knowing it is out there and can be accessed by anyone. I will be glad when its filtered.”
(note that this user is specifically posting in reference to paedophilia, something that is currently dealt with via the police, the ACMA don’t block this, rather they do what should be happening – passing it on to get the source investigated, shutdown and the culprit charged).
My concern is that from the post above, it would seem that this person is going to be “happy” once the filter is in place, and won’t be “upset” any longer. It’s perfectly reasonable to assume that many parents (possibly the above being an example) will let their guard down as I can assure you that with the publicity that this is now receiving, many less informed people won’t know that that the filter isn’t perfect. I doubt very much that the disclaimer will be loudly and publicly disseminated by the Senator – I’d expect the publicity to be more along the lines of “see how much we’ve done to improve online safety” and won’t include the negatives.
How can any reasonable person support a filter that may cause even a small number of parents to drop their guard?
I don’t support any form of internet censorship, and I won’t be voting for the ALP or anyone who supports them whilst this policy is held.
To claim, however earnestly, that basic rights should be up for debate (and a horribly one sided debate at best) is just insulting. If you need feedback, then fine: voters are sick of your party throwing out our rights to buy temporary loyalty from religious and conservative Senators and voters. Claiming it is an act of child protection is even more galling. The whole thing stinks and you aren’t fooling anyone.
There are no words adequate to express my utter disgust at the state of Australian politics. It is most likely that my vote will be worthless in practice, given the differences between the ALP and the Liberals are cosmetic at best. Still, even if it is only symbolic, know that your party won’t be the one getting it, and know why.
Senator Lundy, I appreciate you taking the time to engage with the community on this serious issue, so far Senator Conroy has been less than engaging (this is a majur understatement). If it wasn’t for the good work from senator Ludlam, this whole issue would have largely gone unnoticed in parliament.
I understand the position you are in, but I have to ask, reading all the above concerns people have raised (and some other concerns that are missing), at what point do you concede that this whole policy is flawed? A lot of these aren’t things you can just iron out to end up with a working policy.
I share your opinion of an opt-out style filter. I don’t think this would be workable, not just because people would have to contact their ISP and tell them they want to look at RC content (privacy concerns), but also because there are technical difficulties with having to prevision a filter for all your customers only to have the majority opt out (speculative I know).
Lastly I noticed you referenced Clive Hamilton in your last post, I am not sure if anyone has pointed this out yet (don’t have time to read every comment), but Michael Flood who co-wrote the research paper which launched the policy, later backflipped (came to his senses?) and said he now opposes the mandatory filtering policy. http://newmatilda.com/2009/06/05/original-net-nanny-advocate-does-back-flip
Nice way to marginalise the argument by making those of us that are opposed to any filter are ideologues
To be clear, our arguments are technologically based not ideologically based. Our arguments are based on how the Internet was designed and works. Your Government is tampering with something it doesn’t seem to understand and doesn’t want to, as it refuses to listen to the industry.
It was a mistake for the former Govt to create a secret blacklist & waste millions of taxpayer $ & it is even a bigger mistake for your Govt to add to that mistake. All the blacklist created was a bureaucracy that did absolutely nothing except chew up our tax $. It didn’t stop anyone from seeing anything. At least the blacklist was just a waste of tax $ and didn’t actually tamper with the most incredible human advancement since the printing press. Now you want to tamper with the technology because one special interest group can throw a few votes your way. Your party wants to reverse it’s opposition to the folly of 10 years ago.
The fundamental way the Internet works has not changed in those ten years. Except now there is 1 billion people producing content as opposed to a 100 million. So basically a lot more stuff to look at. In Obama’s words, you can try to get me to focus on putting lipstick on a pig with claims of policy changes and towing the party line but it’s still a pig It was wrong then, it’s wrong now. The technology hasn’t changed, you have.
I think the ideology of a free, open and democratic society, compared to a nanny-state this proposal is furthing us toward, is one worth arguing for.
After all, if the technology all worked fine and it *could* be done, I know that I’d still be here opposing Senator Conroy’s disgusting “your government knows what’s best” policies.
From Senator Lundy’s tagline on this blog, I think she feels the same way. I encourage her to continue to argue for a more open society rather than to bow to those in her party who only want to play politics for the sport.
Let’s have a public sphere event on Senator Conroy’s policy. Bring along Mr Rudd as well. It’s about time he broke his silence on this issue.
It’s like arguing which set of square wheels we should have for a boat that we want to drive on the freeway.
What happened to “evidence-based policy”? Where is the evidence that implementing this sort of filter will make the Internet “safer” for children? Or anyone for that matter?
Let’s be honest, there is none. The chance of children stumbling over the material on the blacklist is essentially zero, the list is too small and the Internet is too big. Not to mention the vast quantities of content not blocked by the filter which is inappropriate for children. So the filter is not a solution for protecting children from inappropriate content on the ‘net.
You could argue, as some have, that the filter protects children indirectly, by removing demand for child porn. Except it doesn’t, it provides a minor technical hurdle for people who are seeking that material. Circumventing it is trivial, and the details of how to do so will be common knowledge in no time. Not to mention that much of this material is probably trafficked on peer-to-peer networks, which are 100% unaffected by the filter.
As far as adults are concerned I see no role for the filter. Either material is illegal, in which case people viewing it should be prosecuted, or it is legal in which case adults should be allowed to make their own mind up about viewing it. What is the third category? Legal but naughty, and blocked by the ineffective filter?
So what is the filter for? Personally I don’t believe the current government is that interested in using it to censor political material. But it is easy to believe a future government might. Remember the hysterical mood after 9/11, and think about how under such circumstances a government might be tempted to use and existing filtering infrastructure for other ends.
It seems clear to me that the filter has one purpose, and that is to serve as a trophy on Stephen Conroy’s political mantle piece. Surely he must be intelligent enough to see that the filter has no practical purpose, however he has invested himself in it, it is his ticket to political stardom. If I am right about this we have very little chance of stopping it.
Kate,
Consider what happens if the Labor Government spends millions on making ISPs offer a clean feed and greater than 80% of Australian internet users opt out (or refuse to opt in, whichever).
Is this really the correct solution to the problem you are trying to solve?
Actually what IS the problem you are trying to solve exactly?
Cheers
Dear Kate,
I see that you use the phrase “Nonetheless please understand I have responsibility as a government Senator” and I am very pleased to see you recognise your first and foremost duty in your revered position, which is of course to represent the people, to whom you are a public servant.
It is obvious that you (or one of your team) has actually put some thought into your post, and for that you get an elephant stamp, however you appear to be putting your membership on the ALP ahead of your duty to those you represent. Clearly there is huge dislike and distrust of the proposed filter, how it will be implemented, who will administer it, and also the possible degradation in Internet performance.
As a technician I can tell you that the Enex report clearly shows a lack of scientific method, with no clearly defined hypothesis to test, a test method which allows for far to many variables, without actually testing the claimed requirements etc. Any high school science student would fail a practical exam with such a poorly designed and implemented test. But it seems to be more than enough for Senator Conroy. I trust you are a little lest one eyed and a little more considerate of the intelligence of the people you were elected to represent. A quick practical example of one missing component of the test is a thing called latency. This is one important aspect of Internet performance, but it does not rate a mention.
I probably don’t need to list my concerns about the filter as they are much the same as everyone else, but I wish to express my concern that you are not representing the majority of Australians if you do not clearly and vocally oppose the filter.
Hi Kate,
I am extremely impressed with your considered response to concerned citizens.
As others have said, and Mr Mark Newton has said many times through the media, if you take the word “mandatory” out, we can all pack up and go home.
In this context, I mean to use “mandatory” to refer to internet subscribers being forced to accept a filtered service. I, and I would wager the majority of opponents, would not mind mandating that ISPs offer a service. I personally wouldn’t mind the ‘active choice’ idea you offer. I’d be particularly interested to see the aggregate statistics generated by such a choice–it is my belief that these would demonstrate overwhelmingly that the reason for the low uptake of NetAlert has absolutely nothing to do with Australians being unaware of it.
Allow each Australian the opportunity to reject a filtered service and you’ll be glad you did.
Ken
The suggestion of some form of ‘opt’ filter has political risks for a government. What if the majority of people opt-out of the filter (or don’t opt-in)?
That would embarrass the government – as the NetAlert situation did for the Liberals (due to its low take-up and ease of breaching).
For the Labor government, keeping a mandatory position is equivalent to avoiding the embarrassment of having only a few people come to their party.
A better solution is to mandate the choice and leave ISPs to consider commercial products as the solution. The government gets the ‘win’ that filters are offered, commercial filter providers compete over the market share (forcing them to improve their products) and any technical issues or filter fallacies are left to the ISPs who are choosing which filters they offer.
Several important questions to consider about any form of mandatory filter:
Disadvantaging the most vulnerable
1) What will be the cost imposed on citizens due to the cost for ISPs of putting mandatory filters in place? (many ISPs currently charge an extra $5-20 per month for a filtered internet offer)
2) Will this cost be offset by the government in any way?
3) If not, what will the government do to prevent the expansion of the digital divide as low income owners make a decision to do without the internet due to additional cost?
Suspending Australian web progress
A mandatory filter makes a lot of Web 2.0 activity high risk due to the concern over user-generated content being sabotaged with blocked material. It would force governments and corporations to weigh up whether they should forego economic and cost benefits in order to address the additional risks.
1) How will the government deal with situations when hackers place blocked content into company (or government) websites (in unobvious places) and then report them to be blocked?
2) How will organisations manage online interactions in a Web 2.0 world under the mandatory filter?
They will not be able to permit free comments or post-moderated user content to be placed onto any website they operate under threat of content being placed that would lead to their site being blocked.
Someone opposed to their products, a competitor, a disgruntled customer, crime organisation or simply a malicious individual could sabotage their site. A large component of Web 2.0 becomes untenable under a mandatory filter.
3) How will governments be able to continue with many Gov 2.0 initiatives if they face the same risks?
4) How will any organisation be able to include externally sourced dynamic content in a website if they could have their website blocked for displaying a stray inappropriate comment (such as in a Twitter feed)?
Constraining good policies and programs
1) How will certain not-for-profits and government agencies be able to continue to develop appropriate policies and programs for communities if they no longer have a window into the issues and behaviours they should expect? For instance, people supporting potential suicide victims need to understand the methods that could be used to kill someone in order to prevent them from being used.
2) If community values in a state or nationally shift, how (and how quickly) will this be recognised in changes to the filtering criteria?
3) How do we support open and honest conversations between Australians when a filter restricts the thoughts we can express? Homosexuality was illegal in one Australian jurisdiction until 1997. It may have still been illegal if people were not able to discuss the area online. Hence any material the government blocks effectively shuts down another conversation for Australia’s future.
Not only will Labour not get my vote but the Greens wont either. If Labour is hoping to pick up Green preferences then they had better forget about it.
With Labour led by a fanatical Catholic, the Liberals with an equally fanatic Catholic leader, and with the Greens choosing the right-leaning and fanatical Clive Hamilton as a candidate, it really is a terrible choice that we are faced with.
A significant number of people will change their vote on this issue alone. Labour will probably lose the vote of many people under age 30, including many of the 3% of population who will be first time voters.
No matter what Labour does now, short of sacking Conroy (and Rudd who is really the brains behind this stupid policy), the damage has already been done.
I’m an ALP member and have participated and observed various campaigns. Here are some thoughts.
There are a lot of Labor voters expressing outrage at Labor’s filtering policy, to the extent that they are prepared to place this issue above almost every other issue. Since the Liberal Party opposes this plan, for the time being, these angry voters are likely to seriously start thinking about preferencing the Liberals.
This is a dangerous situation for Labor because the biggest problem a political party has in trying to win new votes is that people simply don’t pay attention to what they are saying – and this issue will cause many Labor voters to pay attention to the Liberals. It is a break-through issue.
Once a voter pays attention to a party they will start examining other positions that the party takes and realise that some of these other positions are OK as well. They may even identify Labor as the “enemy” and give the Liberals a mental “thumbs up” each time they attack Labor on an issue – any issue. In the past they simply blocked out the alternative party, but now they don’t.
Tony Abbott hasn’t yet done anything to make it easy to reflexively dismiss him as an option, in his time as leader so far. The Liberals also have some fairly hard-line characters like Minchin who are likely to hold the line on the issue and have his ear.
The longer Labor lets this go on the worse it will be. It is already a bit late because trust in the minister and possibly the PM has been damaged.
I don’t know if this issue will add up to Labor losing a seat in the House of Reps but it could cost seats in the Senate and permanently shift preferences to the Liberals.
Labor should be most concerned about youngish males who aren’t that politically engaged but just think Labor are idiots for pursuing this and resent being compared, by implication, with child molesters because they disagree with a patronising, preachy, know-all government. In contrast these voters may find Abbott’s aggressive and forthright demeanor appealing. They voters don’t write comments on blogs about this issue but I wonder if they show up in polling.
As an ALP member, this is exactly the problem with this issue.
In reality, for all their bluster here, almost noone will vote for Abbott because of this filter. But we can alienate our own supporters and give a free kick to our opponents. That free kick might not win them the game, but it wont help us. And as all Swans supporters know, full forwards who gives away free kicks too often should be traded to Footscray quick-smart.
I wouldn’t characterise the views here as “bluster” and I wouldn’t presume to know what voters will do about this. The anger here is white-hot and visceral but also well thought out. Many place internet censorship above all other issues because the internet is how they know about all other issues. They might feel they can’t vote to censor the internet because it would be contrary to their sense of self-respect and personal integrity. ALP members get used to compromising but others have less inhibition.
I am not an ALP member (nor a member of any party), so I don’t reflexively vote for them. Whilst I can understand why a person like yourself thinks that Abbott isn’t viable, it is worth bearing in mind that most of us think Rudd is little better. In reality, most people are stuck voting for the least worthless candidate – Rudd is PM because he is the least worst choice, not because he actually has any merit.
I’ll put my cards on the table, I don’t like Abbott at all. However, since the ALP refuses to listen to the overwhelming voice of the people, then what choice do I really have in practice? I can’t vote for the ALP or anyone who gives them preferences at this point, because it will be taken by the ALP as a blanket mandate for their stupid policies rather than a vote for the least worst option that it is.
The simple fact is that I’m not able to vote for a trustworthy and responsible party because none exists in Australia with sufficient numbers to form a Government. So, knowing that I cannot vote for what I want, what can I use my vote for? My two options at this point are abstaining from casting a valid vote (which is ineffective in my mind) or casting a protest vote (which is highly probably at this point).
If the ALP is going to betray me by selling my basic human rights to buy conservative religious votes, then I’m going to punish them (and remembering that no party represents my views anyway, do I really have anything to lose by doing that?). If I am going to suffer, then so shall they.
I am keen into understanding the tools you refer to.
It seems that the mentioning of tools without a proper roadmap suggest on the incomplete solution the filter is.
I suggest that insted of pushing a solution just for the sake of ticking a check box in your policy to brag about later when you need to be reelected please thakt the time and think about how you can really make my kids safe.
How about education to the parents how to track activities on places like facebook and others?
How about developing a software enabling the parents to see activity that is suspicius, credit cards are capable of it why cant the australian government do the same?
Most client aplications as mentioned above outtake the solution you offered in many aspects.
This patch is to come off as soon as the adhesive dries so please be more realistic and think about your solution and tools you promote beyond your reelection future, you are dealing with peoples lives.
Another thing that bothers me is the suggestion that i am lead with an ideology for not wishing to give the government the power it seeks.
Sorry but its not ideology, just an inate fear of enabling the government to supress opposing opinion using the censurship. nothing to do with freedom of speach and the sorts.
Its driven of the fear that australian citizens will be led to believe their kids are safe on the internet when thay are totally not safe to say the least.
The discussion over mandatory or not is just a diversion of the topic. it was promised not to be mandatory in the 2007 policy and should remain that way. Sen. Conroy has misled with his statement and only needs to correct his wrong doing that is all.
Please go back to your drawing board because this baby will not fly for long if at all.
Keep our children safe.
Y.
Thankyou for taking time to consider the comments we have been making. It is certainly a pleasant change from the nil consideration of the minister in charge of this censorship policy.
There is one major concern to me when I read your response and that is the part about penalties for bypass.
[quote]
This raises the question of whether penalties for circumvention will apply even when RC content is not accessed, including for many young people who are technologically capable. It also raises questions about what, if any penalty would be applied to individuals who circumvent, opt-out or otherwise access material on the black list, even if the material is not illegal other than it is on the blacklist.
[/quote]
So are we going to see people imprisoned for simply surfing the web and clicking on a link that links to a “secret and unknown” banned page. It is incredible that in a “free” society you could even suggest that someone could be imprisoned for accessing perfectly legal information that happens to be classified RC. Remember that it legal to access and read/view legal RC material, just not distribute it.
How dare the government even consider such a thing, its just like the repressive governments that have internet censorship. Its so wrong it makes me ashamed to be called Australian.
The Labor Party has certainly lost my vote!
Fredrick, I touched on circumvention penalty as well (that if that was seen as a solution I would find the policy more repugnant).
I think Kate was really just reiterating concerns raised in the previous blogg post though. It’s a dot point reflecting concern that one day penalties will be introduced for circumvention.
I’m pretty sure that Kate wasn’t raising that as her own solution to circumvention. (It’s not possible to criminalise circumvention unless you want to add a law that’s impossible to police. Many circumvention techniques cross over into legitimat business and communications use)
why are you people even attempting to reason with this situation.
The entire concept of a government run firewall is offensive ( to the extreme) to what this country is all about. Our fathers didnt fight wars in all spots of the world for some little snake called conroy and co to come in and destroy what it means to be free..
Get it through your head. protecting children is a job for their PARENTS. NOT THE GOVERNMENT.
We are free people and you work for us, remember that. Your facing destruction in the next election because of this draconian filth your trying to sweet talk us into.
History and people will remember you and your little gang.
What is the difference between the labor goverment enforcing its moral views on us as opposed to the taliban enforcing their moral views on afghanis? Just because you dont shoot people doesnt make you better then them, just not as committed.
It seems the labor goverment is more of a risk to the australian people then osama and his boys.
Wowsers like you and conroy should be run out of town and never be near power ever again. Bloody communists.
Kate, I’d just like to offer a quick message of thanks for your obviously well thought-through response. This being the Internet a lot of people are very quick to jump to negative conclusions about people in positions of power very quickly, but I can tell you have applied a very critical analysis to the matter, and have also listened with open ears to the comments that have been shared with you.
This is something that I personally have come not to expect from many politicians, who prefer to keep voters in the dark and just count on them either not caring enough to take action, or not understanding enough to not be fooled by hyperbole.
So THANK YOU Kate for reminding me that there ARE politicians out there who are intelligent and thoughtful individuals, willing to look further than just accepting party lines. Whatever action you end up taking or not taking when the bill comes through the Senate next year, you should hold your head high with the knowledge that you at least take that action as an informed individual. I hope you are able to convince your colleagues to reassess the necessity of a filter which cannot be opted out of. If you share with them the same views you have posted on this page, I can only hope that some of them will have the sense to apply themselves as much as you.
THANKS KATE
Regards,
John Baker
I note with passing amusement that Kate’s slogan sub-heading her blog reads “Taking Australia forward with openness and vision”.
@Dave,
Senator Lundy needs to add an asterisk at the end of her blog tag-line and the place the following disclaimer at bottom of the page:
* Australia will only be taken forward with the degree of openness and vision allowed by the majority of the ALP caucus.
Kate,
Thank you for opening up your blog and allowing feedback.
I would have no major problem with an ‘opt in’ option being put forward to ISP customers. This is perfectly reasonable to me and puts the choice back in the hands of the people.
However, I highly doubt I will have anything to do with a Labor party while Stephen Conroy has any kind of influence, I am sure this will be true for many others also. I am not voting for a political party with a senator that assumes I am a supporter of child abuse material because I oppose this filter – this tact is not a vote winner and stinks of Howard-era gutter politics.
Best to you,
Matt
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.
Kate, you deserve some respect for engaging with the public like this – as far as I know you’re the only politician to actually do so. Not to discount that, but the remarkable thing is not that you do it, but that no-one else does.
Back to the issue at hand…
“In other words, there was an ambivalent reaction to the policy at the time of the election policy because *it was not understood to be a mandatory filter* for the general population.”
No – there was an ambivalent reaction to the policy because it was not *stated or proposed* to be a mandatory filter for the general population. That’s a *very* different thing, isn’t it?
Please stop treating us like idiots. We know what you said and no amount of spin or historical revisionism will change that.
As you say, no-one has a problem with ISPs *offering* a filtered feed for those who choose to have it, just as we didn’t have a problem with Howard’s distribution of tax-funded filtering software for those who wanted it (though, if memory serves, the takeup was minuscule and cost per CD consequently astronomical).
Face it, Kate – this policy is unsupportable.
Hi Kate.
In order to stifle claims of censorship and the taking away of peoples rights why not offer a free pc based filter. There are many filters about. They will be more effective, and customizable by parents to block what the parents think is inappropriate for their children.
Kate, what do you think about this idea?
I believe that the Liberal Government offered a scheme like this, and then Senator Conroy killed it with no replacement,thus endangering children by letting them see net nasties. With this in mind, you can not say that the internet Censorship scheme is about protecting children.
The only explanation for the Censorship scheme is for the Rudd government, and any future government, to control the flow of information.
Cheers.
Dave
For me it’s simple: I agree with the original ALP Policy from 2007. Make it mandatory for ISP’s to OFFER a clean feed. OFFER is the key word, not force it on everyone! This is the first time I have been bitterly dissapoited with the Rudd Government. I am an ALP membere here in SA and the idea of a MANDATORY filter disgusts me. Thank you for speaking out Kate. Just advocate for an “opt-in” and everyone can be happy!
1 trillion web pages x 3.3% false positives = 33 billion web pages blocked unnecessarily.
I fully support opting-in to a filtering service that an ISP is required to offer to operate in Australia, even if providing that service to other people means it costs me a slightly more each month.
However, this should most definitely be opt-in, I should not have to opt out of it.
This is like the argument for surveillance – if you’re not doing anything wrong, why should you care if we watch you? The counter-argument is if you have no reason to suspect I’m doing anything wrong, why are you watching me?
Two of the other concerns is the breadth of the RC classification (un-classification may be a better term), and the dynamic nature of the Internet.
The classification scheme that is proposed to be used for web material (well, is being used — but not in a mandatory manner) was originally designed for films and television.
For material such as this, it is reasonable that some sort of broad (and mostly advisory) guidelines be given as they provide some sort of measure of the content. Whilst film and television are both explicitly viewed (you make a choice to watch a film), it is possible to be subject to a considerable amount of material between the point at which (say) you find you’ve taken your children to a X rated movie and the time you get them from the theatre. The fact is, at the levels of R 18+ and X the classifications are no longer advisory for children so you are “assisted” in your ability not to make that error.
The same classification is applied to some printed publications, although not all. Public libraries contain books with very adult content, and although some libraries steer children away from them, there is little serious effort to make sure they cannot view the material. In the cases where material is regularly classified, the producers of that material can alter content slightly for a given audience (and will likely be doing so anyway — for example to accommodate relevant advertising)
Electronic games are a bit of a joke because of our lack of R18 or higher classification. In addition, on-line game play between two live participants can hardly be classified beforehand. Where such games include the option for players to speak to each other there are clearly few limits on what could potentially be said. Indeed, one could read an RC classified book, or graphically describe the contents of an RC rated magazine. For an on-line game the options for the producer of the material to render different content to players in different parts of the world is limited because it would essentially have players on one location playing a different game.
Instant messaging is the distillation of the person-to-person communication problem for classification. It is fair to include many types of communication such as voice over IP, text messaging and a plethora of other means individuals have to communicate directly over the internet. None of these are considered by the Government’s censorship proposal. None lend themselves to any form of classification as the content is user generated at the time of use. Some (like voice over IP) are, or may be, integrated into our existing telephone infrastructure where filtering and censorship would be seen as extremely draconian. Others are encrypted, meaning that any attempt at filtering the content would be defeated. Many of these systems allow files containing *anything* to be transferred. If the filtering of the voice is not possible, then generally neither is the content of these files. Lastly, instant communication is something that is extremely widely used by children and young adults. The growth area is that of us older adults (30+).
Online (web) content is a far harder target — and you mention a number of reasons in your article. Perhaps the greatest obstacle though is the definition of what is proposed to be filtered. Online RC content is different from the film, television, and printed material form of RC. It includes all of that, PLUS most of which is rated R18 or X, and some amount of what is rated M15+. You have touched on one of the problems of scope — 1000, or even 10,000 URLs will hardly scratch the surface of this material. The absurd notion is that if we took Stephen Conroy at his word, that R and X material would not be blocked, the nature of the material allowed through would be what many consider the filter would be protecting them against. Even if we consider just the narrow ratings R and X (and assume that there are no difficulties in assigning these ratings) the option becomes a choice between blocking perhaps many millions of URLs, allowing it all through, or blocking just what people complain about. The first will be impractical, the second protects nobody, and the third has all the disadvantages of both and none of the advantages.
But worse than this is that even what we classify as child abuse material (and that is what most would consider to be part of “the worst of the worst” — from it’s description) differs greatly from the definition in other countries. Thus, whilst child abuse material in some forms (let us consider actual images of actual children actually being sexually abused) is pretty much uniformly illegal. I can find no jurisdiction which does not act to remove it. However if we remove any of those seemingly superfluous “actual”s the case is less clear. “actual images” — if the form is cartoon then the material is potentially legal in Japan. “actual children” — if the children are actually over the age of 18 then the material is potentially legal in the US. “actual abuse” — well, let’s look at the negative, in Australia the abuse does not even need to be actual — some expert can say that what is happening *might* harm a child. I am not going to claim that there is anything gravely wrong with Australia’s definition, however it must be realised that there are many imagined (and real) possibilities where an image may be defines as child abuse material in Australia, but the country of origin would not do so and therefore the “producer” of such material is under no pressure to act. This becomes a huge filtering problem if the material is hosted on a high volume site (as described in the report).
As we move further away from the type of material where there — at least at a broad level — is universally agreement, the problems do not get smaller. Whereas the amount of child abuse material on the internet is quite small (made larger by Australia’s definition) this amount pales into insignificance when you consider “adult pornography”. Again, Australia has definitions that are not the same as other countries. These fall into several categories: sex+violence, fetish, and access. Real sex + violence pretty much guarantees an RC rating in Australia, as do many fetishes, and even without these there are some unique Australian requirements for access limitation (of which compliance may breach other countries laws) that move otherwise “acceptable” content to RC. Because our definitions are not universally accepted, there is almost zero chance that they will be adopted by overseas operators — hence we would be forced to block huge amounts of this material.
The RC classification also includes a number of aspects that may be reasonable for film, but are troubling for the web. Restrictions on what are effectively information about how one could carry out a crime are reasonable in a movie as for entertainment purposes such material could be glossed over (i.e. censored) for a particular market. However the internet is perhaps more akin to a library, a place where one could go to find detailed information about opening locks (which may be useful for burglars or locksmiths). Sites that provide support for sufferers of addictions (and we can broadly include conditions such as anorexia here too) may also allow user-generated content which might describe “safe” methods of undertaking illegal activities. Thus whilst we no longer treat male homosexual behaviour as illegal and would therefore allow a site to promote the use of condoms for such people, to do something similar to describe (for example) how to ensure some drugs were safe before injecting them would be far more likely to be classified RC.
And to expand on the “more like a library” concept… I mentioned earlier that if one sees something in a movie theatre, it is difficult to instantly remove yourself from the environment, the same does not apply to the internet. The days of “porn pop-ups” are pretty much behind us, and even when they were prevalent, they were not hiding on children’s web sites. The option to back out of a web site you find troubling is only a mouse click away. It is as easy as closing a book that you do not like, and without the problem of needing to place it back on a shelf.
All of the preceding issues pale into insignificance if we consider dynamic material. Material on the web can be dynamic in several ways:
1) the same URL can render differently to people in different locations
2) the same url can render differently at different times
3) the same content can be found at a great number of different URLs
4) the same IP address can be used by many web sites
The first problem is an issue for regulators. Already there is software for certain peer to peer applications which causes material to be blocked if you are deemed to be coming from a certain class of location — these locations are typically media, government, and law enforcement. Given this software technique it is certainly possible to create a web page that contains RC content, but renders as puppies and rainbows to the regulator.
The content may vary over time. This may cause a particular URL to be RC for a while, then G, then M, then RC again. Depending on when the regulator views the material, a different classification may be given, one that will outlast the material.
It is also possible that a web site can give out URLs that are essentially ever-changing. The URL that someone views and reports is no longer valid when the regulator tries to retrieve it, however the material is still there under a different URL. Whilst a sequence of steps to find the material may work, blocking by URL will not.
It is not uncommon for web sites to be accessible several ways. An example is that the Australian google page can be accessed by using http://www.google.com.au, or google.com.au. However the same content can be reached by entering http://www.google.com.au/webhp?fp=1, or http://www.google.com.au/webhp? or http://www.google.com.au/?# or even http://www.google.com.au/?#jdkfjdks. Indeed it is generally not possible to determine whether some of the material in a URL is significant or not, and therefore whether the page being sought is the same as one on a blacklist or different. Depending on how you make the decision, you will either under or over block, and the same decision could result in a different outcome with different parameters and/or different web sites.
It may appear that the easy solution is to block access to a web site completely — and to do it by IP address to counter the possibility of several domain names being registered. However, many IP addresses now dynamically point to multiple web sites, and load balancing solutions mean that many ip addresses can point to the same web page — the old 1 to 1 relationship no longer holds. The potential for overblocking is growing (rather than shrinking) with advances in the use of the internet. (My employer has, at last count, about 20 separate web sites running from a single IP address, and we are only scratching the surface of what is possible and actually done on other servers)
This brief note only scratches the surface of these issues.
I have less of a problem with you supporting a policy that you may not agree with than I do with you supporting a policy that you know cannot work.
What many of the filtering supporters cannot get their head around is why professionals in an industry would be so vocal in opposition to something that was completely ineffective.
My position is that if you’re going to spend a lot of money doing something that you claim will “help the children” then it should at the very least not cause potential harm to those children. If parents believe in this effective filter they may be putting their children at more risk.
Better to provide more education FIRST and be assisted by filtering than it is to put all your eggs in a basket that has huge holes in it.
Some notes that weren’t addressed re: Enex testing.
All testing was voluntary, not mandatory. No one ISP applied a filter as a mandatory requirement to 100% of it’s userbase for the period of the trial…
The blinding for the trial was so far from ‘scientific’ it was laughable. It didn’t even line up for the base requirement of single blinding let alone double or triple blinding to insure the purity of results are untainted.
And let’s not forget Sen. Conroy’s assertion that you do the trial then decide what results you want… Such a ridiculous concept, not setting a baseline/goal before testing…
How about the complete lack of interest in the NetAlert filter despite millions spent promoting it? I’m sure Labor could find the figures on the number of active subscribers when the program was finally axed…
Moving on to issues more esoteric, Sen. Lundy, what is your take on this?
http://stilgherrian.com/politics/completely-inappropriate-senator-conroy/
http://stilgherrian.com/politics/dear-kate-ellis-mp/
Do you support Sen. Conroy’s attack on a citizen of this country and a member of the voting public? Do you support Sen. Ellis silence on the issue? Exactly how far is the government prepared to go and are there no depths that the Labor party will not sink to to get this plan in?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very appreciative of, and respect, the fact that you actually respond to people directly rather than via form letter. But as the only person willing to walk out in front of the firing squad, as it were, you’re the only person who seems to give a crap about answering (or at least attempting to answer) all these hard questions that we have been sitting on for months if not years.
Hi Kate,
As you are aware, there are around 40,000 people just on facebook who have taken the time to join a group specifically against internet censorship in Australia, and this is only just counting the people who can be bothered to join up on facebook, I think you will find the numbers are much more significant, significant enough to effect election outcomes.
The approach of Stephen Conroy to label anyone who is against the filter as pro child pornography is a undeveloped and immature response, I believe the ALP has misread general public sentiment and this policy is quite damaging.
I personally, will not be voting Labor solely on this one issue and voting accordingly to avoid preference directed towards the ALP as well.
Regards
Grant Phillips
Dear Senator Lundy
I have read the whole story of the pros and cons of a `clean feed’, and I share the views of the vast majority of popular opinion that imposing filtering on everyone’s ISP feed has technical limitations both on effectiveness at weeding out offensive material and in terms of slugging the traffic speed.
PC-based filtering may not be a suitable household-based solution because an under-age person may access another PC in the house used by their parents which might not have filtering installed.
I believe it is easily possible though to `offer’ customers a filtered feed at minimal additional cost, while still maintaining existing feeds for those who do not require or wish to have a filtered feed.
Every ISP has a `server address’ used when a customer logs on to their ISP, usually in the form: ” server.isp.com.au ‘ or similar.
Why can ISPs not add a server address in the form: ” filter.server.isp.com.au ” which is selected as an opt-in decision by the customer in their TCP/IP settings, and used to log in within PC profiles of under-age users?
Signing in using the filtered server would allow access to material fed via a filter, but only for those who require it.
I can foresee that any filtered feed is undoubtedly going to provide a slower traffic speed for the same site, but this payload would only be borne by those using that server and would not affect everyone else.
There is of course the need for users’ profiles to be set up in this way, but there are sign-up packages available now from most ISPs which would need little modification to provide this alternative.
To me, this seems to be a very simple, yet elegant solution which solves everyone’s problems and overcomes all objections I’ve seen to date.
Dear Kate and Pia
Thanks for allowing us to make our voices heard. As an ACT resident and an IT professional I am a member of the two most ignored and despised (by Politicians) communities in the country. Your blog has assisted with getting our views across.
I would like to draw your attention to the laws of unintended consequences, where anything you do today in Government can be used by your opponents when they take Government. For example, Labor brought in HEX the Libs expanded HEX and cut university funding, Labor brought in mandatory detention, and the Libs expanded it and deported an Australian permanent resident to Manilla.
I can just see a future Phillip Ruddock saying “We will decide who uses the Internet and the Web sites they will visit” cue loud applause.
Please leave the Labor party and become an independent so I can vote for you at the next election.
Kind Regards
Warwick
I just noticed this in your original page:
“…when Clive Hamilton from the Australia Institute brought a broad left view into the debate…”
If you consider Mr Hamilton “broad left”, then I think a lot is explained: that the Labor party has moved so far to the right that someone like Mr Hamilton could be described as broad (or, indeed, any kind of) left sends shivers down my spine.
The light on the hill has been turned off.
Hi Kate,
Thank you very much for your (even if only percieved) further care to the matter.
I have still several things that won’t change with this current policy:
- We are still implimenting a system that allows a government agency to censor things that are not considered illegal – this cannot happen as its opens a million grey areas that will have scope creap over time – the christian lobby will assure us of that.
- The filter of 10,000 URLs cannot and will _never_ come close to being even a drop in the ocean of what would/should be blocked if you are blocking things that are “fetishes” etc.
- the technical implications are large for any size isp to impliment this and maintain it and this cost will be passed onto consumers either in government taxs or extra costs to the consumer (forget the argument that still rages about whether is will/won’t slow the net)
- there is no way to opt out and even if there was, the thought of being on a list of people who “want to look at things RC” would stop a lot of people from using this freedom – OPT IN is the _only_ democratic solution
- senator conroy has moved the goal posts so many times since being voted in on an “election promise” that what is being proposed is not _the_ election promise therefore where is _my_ say in this matter as a concerned citizen? I DIDN”T VOTE FOR THIS – stop assuming, that conroy co. are doing _my_ bidding
- Why does the rhetoric continue to be “all about child porn” when both sides know that RC is not just child porn? This is nothing but lies and misdirection to the Australian public.
- Why will it be illegal to bypass the filter? the election promise was to “provide” a filter, if you make it mandatory and i have no children then i believe it is my right to bypass it. I believe that ‘choice’ is what makes a democracy and therefore removing my choice is strongly against what i believe makes our country great – i did not choose to have a _mandatory_ filter
- Why does not wanting the government to censor material on the internet make me either into child porn OR “ideologically and implacably opposed to a filter” as you continue to patronise us with. Secondly and i believe more importantly, even if i was “ideologically and implacably opposed to a filter” and i was in majority it would not matter – I have a right as an Australian citizen to have my opinion heard and accepted in ways a democratic society should show its citizens
The frustration that this issue has caused is mainly because the lack of transparency and choice offered to Australians has been little to none and the arrogant responses from the ministry of Senator Conroy has been swift and overly aggresive.
People working in IT are not stupid, their concerns technologically are real – they are not aggressors but people more knowlegable than the senator stating their concerns.
Every interview i’ve seen with senator conroy he is always on the attack against people who make any claim against his will.
Take for example this podcast inteview:
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/163364,podcast-conroy-explains-his-net-censorship-regime.aspx
in which he goes off on a tangent to try and discredit people against the filter by insinuating they were “wrong before” so they are probably wrong now. Why the need to discredit them? their concerns ARE REAL!
I said it before and will say it again, like the diggers that faught for my freedom in the past, next election “lest we forget” as Labor has lost my vote.
The main concern is that word “mandatory”. “Mandatory” is what makes this legislation police state legislation. “Mandatory” is what embarrasses us as a nation by putting us in the same sentence as North Korea, China and Iran. “Mandatory” is what implies that Senator Conroy considers all Australian citizens to be children.
If the filter were NOT mandatory, I would base my vote on other issues. Labor would still be implementing a filter that doesn’t remove 99.9999% of the material it is supposed to remove, that DOES remove some material that it shouldn’t remove, that can be perverted secretly by whatever government is in charge of it, that can be circumvented easily, that provides a completely false sense of security for parents, and that slows down internet access, but at least those things would only apply to those who choose to adopt it. The impression of the Rudd Labor government that I had when I voted for it – that it was a government for the future that understood issues like the internet – will still have taken a permanent hit, and I can’t imagine I will ever be able to trust Senator Conroy no matter what role he has in future governments (reminds me of Peter Reith, who seemed to be given whatever portfolio the government most needed lies to be told in at the time), but I will at least not feel morally compelled to vote for Abbott.
Opt-in will be better than opt-out, but I can live with either. Forcing an option on startup with an ISP might be useful. Ultimately, I doubt it will matter a great deal, because this filter is less effective than the Liberal one Tom Wood disabled, so I can’t imagine it’s going to survive long anyway, nor have a high rate of adoption. Perhaps that’s not correct, as those who DO adopt it are likely to be those parents unaware of their children circumventing it anyway. However, given the “2%-for-and-96%-against” Herald poll result, it might be better to make it opt-in, so the 2% are required to act rather than the 96%.
Ms Lundy, thank you for at least having the courage to engage in open discussion with the people of Australia on this issue, which is more than Senator Conroy seems prepared to do. I appreciate your efforts on our behalf. I will continue to consider it morally impossible to vote for a party that has mandatory Internet censorship, so please do try to make your colleagues see reason, and also make them aware of the level of anger in the community about this issue, and the massive backlash continued intransigence is likely to produce. It remains a great shame that the Labor party came up with this ill-considered and hopelessly inept legislation.
Spot on, Martin. I couldn’t have said it better.
The comments supporting Conroy are basically apologies for an ill conceived resort to censorship. They do underline a growing authoritarian trend in the ALP which has recently made it impossible for me in conscience to vote ALP after over 50 years of support.
Thank you for this update. This is far more reasonable, but I think it still misses several key points.
The first is the legality of Refused Classification. Refused Classification is *not* the same as illegal, nor the ‘worst-of-the-worst’ that Senator Conroy keeps implying. Indeed, almost all material that falls under the Refused Classification banner is legal for people in the ACT (and most of Australia) to posses and view. While it may be illegal to screen ‘Ken Park’ to an audience, it is not illegal to watch the movie in the privacy your own home. While it may be illegal to sell ‘The Peaceful Pill’ in book stores, it is not illegal to have a copy in your possession.
Thus, using RC as the basis for a filter is very much ‘thin-edge-of-the-wedge’. There is a vast amount of material in it that reasonable people can disagree on. An optional filter is better, because such material is then accessible to those who want it.
However, I don’t see how this is that different to the current situation, where there do exist Australia wide ISPs that provide reasonable, even dynamic, filtering to their subscribers. What benefit is got by forcing all ISPs to have half-hearted filtering, when there are those who already specialise in it? Perhaps the government could just look at subsidising filtering for those ISPs who want to specialise in it. Something that would mean that the implementation of a filter is cost neutral to an ISP, and those who do provide it can compete with those who don’t on the same playing field cost-wise.
The second point is that the Broadcasting Services ACT is very clear on what makes up the Australian Communications and Media Authority’s blacklist. It defines ‘Prohibited Content’ and ‘Potentially Prohibited Content’. Both of these are not the same as Refused Classification, and indeed far, far broader. The government cannot use the ACMA blacklist, and claim ‘only Refused Classification’ while these sections of the Broadcasting Services ACT stand. Senator Conroy has repeatedly stated that the government does not intend to amend the BSA, but to simply make the blacklist mandatory to filter. As Prohibited Content can include material rated as low as MA15+, this is a vastly different to claims of only Refused Classification.
I am not opposed to filtering as a tool for parents (or weak willed people) to help control internet usage. I am opposed to the government deciding what material is acceptable for me to view in the privacy of my own home.
Finally, I’m not sure how much of an election commitment can be claimed with regards to filtering. The election was hardly fought over this issue, and there were far more concerning reasons to want to relieve the Howard government of power. Given the late in the game release of this policy, and the unpopularity of the Howard government, it seem disingenuous to claim popular support for mandatory internet filtering given the election outcome.
It seems to me that you are still missing the point. You say in your post here that you “have outlined some ideas as to how the policy could better reflect the original election commitment of a mandatory filter for children”.
You then say “the policy at the time of the election” would “require ISPs to offer a ‘clean feed’ internet service to all homes, schools and public internet points accessible by children, such as public libraries.”
There was never any mention of mandatory in the policy ‘promise’ you made. It is pretty clear to me that we have been blatantly misled and lied to.
Hypocrites.
Furthermore, you try to make it alright by offering up alternatives yet still say you are obliged to tow the party line. How about stopping to think for a moment what your role is – to represent us, the people. I have not heard a positive word said about this censorship debacle yet you still decide to push on anyway. Thought about listening to the people?
Hypocrites.
On the one hand you, the politicians, trust us as adults to elect a government to run our country. As soon as you are in power you change your mind and decide we are not adult enough to make up our own mind and raise our children in a responsible way.
Hypocrites.
In the past I was proud to be an Australian but now I’m not so sure. Where we previously followed, if not led, the free world in terms of policy we now follow the likes of China. In August 2008 Kevin Rudd said this of censorship in China during the Olympics, “they should have nothing to fear by open digital links with the rest of the world” (see
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/08/01/2321380.htm). Sure, they blocked sites such as Amnesty International and the like but what’s the difference when the blacklist contains sites such as those containing information about abortion? Euthanasia? Drug use? The list goes on. Seems as though there is some religious thought policing going on here. Hardly protecting children now are we?
Hypocrites.
Just the other day you said, “Mr Abbott wants to take the choice away from parents and force every kid in every school to study the Bible”. By preventing access to information that doesn’t sit nicely with the religious beliefs of Rudd your party is doing little different.
Hypocrites.
Can you see a pattern forming? I think I can sum up the entire party in one word. No points for guessing what it is…
My fear is the future. Who is there to stop the filter being misused by future governments.
And in the meantime, the reality is that the filter will not stop people from accessing the sites that are on the blacklist.
This is bad policy. Individuals should be given the choice to opt in and parents/families should be given the responsibility to protect their children.
my take: http://aqualung.typepad.com/small_pieces/2009/12/my-thoughts-on-the-internet-filter-issue.html
But let’s face it.. are our voices really being heard? Really? When its been pointed out this is one of the only senator even having a discussion about it – one who has consistently fed back semantic dribble with an underlying statement she will not deviate from the party line, rather than address specific questions aimed at the gaping logical flaws?
This is a joke – and when we disturb the peace to be heard they will throw us in jail and admonish the protests across channel 7, 9 and on the front page of MX I’m sure.
Is it fair to say apathy will be our reckoning as we consume our way to indentured servitude?
Never mind; the poli’s will still get paid out of the tax dollars – all the whilst ‘letting us be heard’.
Does that make you feel warm and fuzzy? Me too.
“But let’s face it.. are our voices really being heard?”
I’d like to know that too. How do we know Lundy’s not just paying lip service and then totally ignoring us? How do we know if she’ll actually take our concerns to caucus?
Rudd and Conroy have caused so much ill-will and distrust of the ALP thanks to the censorship policy, so it’s hard to trust Lundy.
I am fairly confident that this isn’t primarily an issue of lip service to quell dissent on this measure. It’s pretty obvious that this is going to cost her politically.
Basically, from the ALP’s perspective, Senator Lundy actions are a liability – Her words are weakly critical of the policy and her blog is host to hundreds of anti-censorship comments (and counting). It embarrasses the Government, and in no way advances their censorship agenda. Nobody within the party is going to thank or reward her for working against party policy (no matter how obliquely or tacitly).
Agreed Stuart; I assume for Kate this would be ‘the hell of politics’ – having one person to carry the message behind the walls the public cannot reach is definitely a benefit more than hindrance, and for that Kate has my full support.
With that said – repeating without doing, and showing without believing – these things we don’t need – if folks want to take a seat for or against, that’s great, but hopefully a lot don’t sit in the middle and let the ‘against’ energy be slowly wiped out, to be replaced by apathy and… mandatory filtering!
Being heard doesn’t necessarily imply that one’s advice, wishes or recommendations will be followed. Being heard is a good start though, of course.
And yes. It all comes down to trust, and it seems that many people have had that trust shaken otherwise, I think, the question would not be being asked.
When people en masse start wondering aloud if their representative is hearing them, that’s usually a pretty big red flag for any polly.
After all that Kate has done for the IT community, the Internet community and the public and is still doing under what can only be described as adverse conditions, it saddens me to read some of the negative comments and pure vitriol being directed at her. When someone stands up and fights for their beliefs from the inside they deserve our support. If at the end of the day, we don’t win this one I would prefer that Kate still be there to carry on, not be on the outside looking in at a group that doesn’t have someone there to speak for us. If she crosses the floor and gets dis-endorsed, who pray tell is left to defend our rights? Would you rather Kate still be there as a voice of reason or would you prefer Conroy to have full control of the helm with nobody watching out for icebergs?
Save your venom for Conroy, but give your support to Kate. We can’t afford to lose the one shining light we have just so we can show our anger. Pick the right target, not the easiest.
You have my full backing Kate, keep up the good work.
That may be true, but if even representatives that agree that censorship is fundamentally a bad idea won’t take a political stand against it, what is the point of them being there in the first place?
She doesn’t deserve a gold star for giving us the ‘privilege’ of open debate – that is necessary basic precondition for democracy to work at all. The fact that her colleagues don’t give a damn about democracy or doing their jobs properly is a failing of theirs rather than any laudable achievement of hers.
It is the job of every elected representative to listen to the Australian people, and ultimately to do as they wish – she is there to serve you and I first, not herself, not her party, and certainly not Jim Wallace and his cronies. It is both right and fair for her to be answerable for the policies of the party she represents.
Thanks Kate for listening to us, just make the entire thing opt in and that isp’s can volunteer for it and most will be happy (or better yet drop the whole silly idea but I doubt that’s going to happen). Again I’m still going to stress that if Labor push this through as it currently is Labor has lost me as a youth voter along with my friends and family.
So Kate are you for it, against it or just just paying lip service?
As you have already stated “for the Labor caucus”.
Could this money have been better spent (hospitals, investment)?
This filter is low in the media and for the apathetic masses. So you know you can ignore and win!
“None Are So Enslaved as Those Who Falsely Believe They Are Free”
http://ar.to/2009/04/delusional-freedom
votes lost unless the only outcome is an opt-in filter(which already exists, so the ALP will carry on ignorantly and arrogantly).
The beginning of Fascism!
This filter is very disgusting. Coming from a family that historically sits in the very pro-labor camp I can tell you where I will be voting. Not Labor and not the Liberals but for the Greens. This filter is disgusting. It highlights just how far towards the right the Labor party has veered. This is not the social democratic Labor party. Why can’t your party be like the Social Democratic parties in Scandinavia like Swedish Social Democrats or the Norwegian Labor party. I am sick to death with Labor advocating tax cuts. Cutting welfare spending, favouring private education over public education, making aged pensioners get more than single parents and pensioners with disabilities, reducing taxes, giving out $900 handouts, public disclosing performance data of schools, a highly flawed climate changed policy, disgusting intervention… And you claim on your website that, “The Scandinavian labour parties of Sweden and Norway are broadly similar” well thats a lie. The Australian Labor party should hang its head in shame. Your policy is in no sense simliar to your supposed affliates in Norway and Sweden. I support the Greens because they are much more similiar to them than the ALP. The ALP is a sham.
This policy finally brings me to notice how much of a sham the ALP is. I say that coming from a family that has historically supported Labor strongly. However now the times have changed. I now support the Greens and will never be voting Labor again. Why can’t Labor be like it’s fellow “Labor” parties in Scandinavia. Such as the Norwegian Labor Party and the Swedish Social Democrats. Lets look at what you have been doing lately in terms of policy.
1. You continue support Private Education over Public education which in Scandinavia is either completely banned or severely limited.
2. You have continue a in rheotric and in policy the doctrine of cutting taxes.
3. You keep handing out unneccessarily government handouts.
4. You introduced policy that supports Aged Pensioners getting more money than Pensioners who are disabled and it still not the minimum wage.
5. The Howard Government’s intervention is completely atrocious.
6. Ignore it all you want but the fact is your ETS policy was completely flawed and instead of negotiating with the Greens you decided to negotiate with the coalition.
7. You preferenced Family First over the Greens and saw Steve Fielding get into parliament partly why this filter is standing today. A fact that anyone thinking of ever voting Labor should never forget.
And you claim on your website to be poltical party that is broadly simliar to Scandinavian labour parties of Sweden and Norway. That is a completely sham A completely lie. Putting a one next to Labor instead of the Greens in the House of Representatives and the Senate would make me come out of that voting booth feeling sick. I am sure others are feeling the other way that is why the Green vote is growing so rapidly. If your party ever gets it’s act together you should walk up to the doors of the Norwegian Labor party and the Swedish Social Democratic party I am sure they would be feeling sick as me learning of the policy the Australian Labor party is taking. Maybe this page should be put on the filter too:
http://www.alp.org.au/about/index.php
Because if people were to ever research anything about those Scandinavian parties they would realize how much of a sham Labor is and never vote for Labor again.
To make matters worse, Conrad’s proposal is making headlines around the world. Example (the first paragraph from http://www.lepetitjournal.com/content/view/51310/204):
“Australia is the first western power to mandate an Internet filter. Devised to fight against paedo-pornography, the Australian government seems ready to block more sites, even if it paralyses freedom of expression. Is filtering antidemocratic?”
The answer to that question is, of course, “You bet!”, but the fact that the proposed legislation is receiving so much attention overseas just goes to show how extreme it is.
Hi Kate,
Thanks for the blog post and the clarifications of the various positions that should be considered as opposed to a dictatorial declaration of mandatory imposition apparently generated as much by petty spite as by reasoned argument. I am fascinated by the disclosure by Mr Akers in his ACS address on Vimeo that Senator Conroy when approached in private admits that he was sold a poisoned chalice by the crazy, ambiguous policy imposed on him. Whether or not that is the case he has done a brilliant impersonation of a fevered advocate for a policy that has now brought the scorn of the world’s IT community down on his, and by association, all your heads. To think that the cheerers of this farce include the ACL, Cardinal Pell and other regressive conservatives is an embarrasment to all associated with the ALP (including me).
So PLEASE convince Mr Rudd, Mr Conroy and the other less technical aware in the caucus to stop the madness and adopt the perfectly acceptable alternative of making an offer of ISP filter service a condition of terms of use for the ‘working families’ so treasured by their policy designers.
And (as Kevin might, nay WOULD say) “you know what?”, I might even vote Labour again as I have for the past 39 years.
Thanks for your blog and a happy holiday season to you and yours.
More ‘for the children’ lies.
This excuse is being used as a trojan horse to usher in general laws which the Government, Bureacracy, Big Business and certain self-interested vocal groups will use to stifle dissent. Leave the internet alone. There are already parental controls. At last after decades of Hollywood, mindless TV and controlled media adults, have access to an interesting range of ideas. Okay, if its simply bestiality and child pornography then ban just those ones. Funny, I thought they were illegal already. However leave all of the so-called “hate” sites. Normal debate, evidence, logic and an intrinsic moral code is protection enough.
Ahem!. When we provide a comment here there is a box that says “Name”. It does not say “Pseudonym”. Surely those who want to take Senator Lundy to task for not doing what they want should be willing to use their real names? If they are public servants and feel constrained on that account, then a disclaimer to that effect would surely be a reasonable inclusion.
I have to say I agree wholeheartedly with Des. Have the stones to name yourselves.
If you’re a voter – use your name, note your electorate – so that Senator Lundy can pass your views to the relevant Members and Senators.
If you’re a public servant, I’d suggest the new APSC rules give you the green light to express your views as a private citizen separate from your role in the public sector. If you remain reticent, note your use of a pseudonym and why.
If Senator Lundy is to have any influence, her colleagues in the Parliament need to know where and if this issue is to hurt Labor electorally. It’s only then that this policy has a hope of being defeated through public pressure.
While Senator Conroy continues, as it appears, to be influenced by special interest groups in the moral and religious space, and refuses to talk openly and frankly with others, such as the EFA (I am on the board) and others with an opposing interest in this policy, Senator Lundy remains the only friendly ear we can appeal to.
While I remain uncomfortable with her stance (and I am a voter in the constituency for which she is a Senator), I understand that politics is a game of inches and it may take some time for this matter to be public enough and contentious enough in the general electorate as opposed to what is currently largely a technically adept group and their extended circle of influence. Only then will people like Senator Lundy be able to openly and publicly state their position.
I think of people like my sister. At 39 years old, she rarely uses the Internet. I don’t believe she has ever sent an email. Yet she is sure that the moment her kids open a web browser, which is the Internet as far as she’s concerned, there are swarms of pedophiles simply waiting to pounce. We know it’s not the case. However, it’s convincing people like her – ignorant through lack of knowledge or choice – that needs to be our rallying point. Using simple language that explains the issues in words and metaphors they understand.
So, yes, voice your opposition here – long and loud. But try to remain temperate. Note your electorate and your shifting vote. That’s ammunition politicians understand.
Write paper letters to your local Member and Senators. Signing electronic petitions is of no use. The Parliament doesn’t recognise them.
And, figure out some language you can use to explain this issue to your friends, coworkers and family so that they understand the real issue.
Re pseudonyms, I call myself “Martin C” here because that’s what I call myself on the Sydney Morning Herald comment pages, and I wanted to maintain that identity. I wanted a pseudonym on those pages because my surname is distinctive, I could be found in the white pages easily, and I often comment there on religion/atheism, a topic where people can be less than rational. When my mother wrote a letter to the editor years ago about religion, she got half a dozen screeds in the post from people nuttier than squirrel farts, and I’d rather avoid that fate.
For what it’s worth, my electorate is Kingsford-Smith, represented by Peter Garrett, who sang for a decade on themes of liberty and the value of the individual when faced with government oppression, and who will now presumably be toeing the party line by voting for a policy which takes individual choice away from the citizens of Australia and puts it in the hands of the government, with all oversight of it kept secret. I hope his conscience is troubling him. I’ve sent him a letter about it.
Whilst I understand where you are coming from, if you cannot see why identifying yourself with enough information for random people to track you down could be a bad idea then I don’t know what to say to you. It is also not necessarily solely a question of your own safety – I am happy to pay the price for my beliefs, I’m not so willing for my family and friends to do the same.
That being said, if anyone thinks that the Senator’s site isn’t logging their IP address …
The best internet filtering technology is PARENTING… no amount of filter boxes or trials or government regulations and legislation will ever replace that.
only parents that can not bothered supervising their children want this filter in place. If represents false sense if security at best
I believe Conroy is taking lesson from this statement…. I don’t know who said it but anyway here it goes
“The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation”.
Hi all,
Please note – although we’ll continue trying to keep an eye on the blog comments, our office is technically closed as of the 18th December till 4th January for the holidays.
Cheers and have a good break everyone,
Pia
Office of Senator Lundy
Hi Kate/Pia,
Can you please ask why the head of the ACL has been given private briefings on the filter trial results by Senator Conroy, especially considering the vilification of homosexuals expressed by him in this video (for those who can’t watch the video, in response to a question about child sexual abuse in the church, his response was that the church was the victim and in the majority of cases, over 70%, the perpetrators were homosexuals who would not have been admitted to the clergy had the church known they were homosexual).
https://broowery.com/content/what-acl-isnt-saying-publicly-any-more
Cheers,
Andrew.
While it horrifies me, it doesn’t surprise me. Tragically, the more I see of this the more I have no option but to write off the Labor Party as a lost cause.
All very nice points you make here in your blog, but lets be truthful here – you’re just going to blindly vote with whatever your party tells you to do, arent you?
Party unity is more important for your career.
What really makes this policy such a dangerous strategic blunder for the Labor Party is that these issues of democracy, government openness and freedom are heartland LABOR Party issues. A majority of the people fighting not to have their freedom removed – and especially the ones like myself who find it absolutely morally impossible to vote for a party supporting mandatory censorship – are voters who would otherwise have voted LABOR. The people who LIKE the policy – Jim Wallace and his Australian Christian Lobby types – are heartland LIBERAL voters … and you know what? They will clap Senator Conroy on the back for this policy, but in the privacy of the ballot box, they will still vote Liberal.
I too find trying to buy loyalty from the inherently disloyal to be an odd strategy. If you have to bribe them to get their support that’s only going to encourage that behaviour – we don’t even have the filter in existence yet and we’ve already got the ACL baying for a ban on R18+ and X content. How long is it going to be before they want the rest of their beliefs written into law?
You also have to remember that until very recently, it was LABOR’s policy to ban R and X rated material on the internet. This was even what they based the filtering trials on.
To trust that Conroy won’t push for a return to previous Labor policy as a little naive.
The plot thickens. Stephen Conroy was interviewed on itnews recently. He stated that there is already a blacklist of sites and “has been for nine years”. I already knew about this list but something just occurred to me.
Essentially the net filtering debate today centres around a list of sites that we will be prevented from viewing. Given such a list already exists and there supposedly still remains a need for us to be guarded against net nasties doesn’t that demonstrate that it doesn’t work?
Einstein has been attributed as saying insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. One might say the Government is insane?
You have to understand this from the Government’s perspective, not from that of someone who might be interested in fighting child sexual abuse.
If the Government’s filter was about fighting child sexual abuse, they would be attempting to block strictly illegal material – like every other Western democracy that thinks filters might be of some benefit.
But the Government manifestly is not interested in fighting child sexual abuse. It says so itself. The aim of the mandatory filter is to prevent “inadvertent exposure” to material that has been refused classification according to the National Classification Code.
This isn’t about crime fighting. It is about technically enforcing standards of good taste on all Australian citizens whether they want it or not.
Margaret Pomeranz and the NCB have a different opinion about the merits of the film Ken Park. The NCB’s decision means that cinemas can’t show it in Australia. It does not mean it is illegal to own or view it.
What the Government is trying to do with its mandatory filter is make the NCB’s fiats reign supreme. Not just in every cinema and public hall across the land, but in everyone’s living room.
Trying to understand the Government’s policy as a crime fighting initiative misses the point. It’s all about adding an rigorous enforcement arm to the National Classification Code – and to hell what Australians desire to decide for themselves what they will and will not read.
I write more on this here: http://tinyurl.com/bbr2312
jon.
At the top level, this policy represents the fruits of bad political manoeuvring and nothing more. The ALP bought support from the ACL, and now that debt is due to be paid. This is obvious, even without the Jim Wallace in Senator Conroy’s office photo ops.
This is the ACL’s pound of flesh – and its proof of concept. If they can successfully get this into law, then they can get anything they want into law. Then Australia will run the risk of becoming just like all the other little crackpot theocracies around the world.
Stuart Anderson: “The ALP bought support from the ACL, and now that debt is due to be paid.”
This would explain one recurring question that keeps coming up here: why on earth is the ALP apparently going to take a huge political hit on this issue. It is plainly vigorously opposed by over 95% of those it effects – ie people who use the internet. It is now too weak to achieve its stated aim of preventing accidental exposure to kids, and it is trivial to bypass besides. Finally there is no obvious measurable economic or social benefit to having it.
So we have a proposal that won’t work, that would just be a “feel good” gesture even if it did work, and will piss off large numbers of their supporters if implemented. Yet they persist with it. It is a total mystery to me why they would do this. To buy support from the ACL is one explanation I guess.
Still, I would like to see evidence the ALP has bought support from the ACL before leaping to conclusions. Got a link? To me it seems equally likely that devoted Christians like Rudd and Conroy could see it as their godly duty to force their principles down our collective throats. It would be nice to know what the real story is.
There will never be open disclosure of political wrangling, if you are hoping for objective evidence you will be disappointed.
This is a speculative discussion, if one insists on relying solely on evidence then one is stuck taking the Government (and others) at face value and at their word. I find that to be a stretch of credulity – at the very least I expect politicians to be as politically savvy (and as ruthless) as me (These people are professional politicians – it is their job to get their goals implemented via political measures. That includes deception, misdirection, exploiting human nature and weaknesses, bargaining, compromising, etc.).
Politically, if you look at the polling on this idea, it is strongly rejected by stakeholders, but it isn’t that much of an issue for the *entire* electorate. Only just over half of Australia’s population are internet users – that means that there is a huge portion of voters who are unaffected by this, and potentially uncaring about this issue (if not actually in favour of it – moral panic is widely prevalent in society, especially when the debate is framed in terms of child protection. The simple fact is that many people fall for that old trick and simply know no better). From the ALP’s perspective (and arguably, that of most parties in Australia) this isn’t an issue that would decide an election – we may not like that, but that is the reality of the situation currently.
It only makes sense to me this way: the ALP strategists want to keep Steve Fielding onside as part of some plan to entrench Family First on the Senate cross-benches. This could sooner or later give the ALP an alternative to negotiating with the Greens to pass legislation.
So if this is the plan, I would expect a preference deal with Family First in Victoria and possible elsewhere for this year’s election. That is, the preference deal that got Fielding elected in 2004 would not have been some ghastly mistake, it would be part of a long-term ongoing strategy.
I recall a campaign meeting with a strongly religious ALP Right factional figure who, like Conroy, grew up in Canberra. At this meeting, he produced some out-of-date note-taking stationery from the office of independent Senator Harradine, the conservative Tasmanian who held the balance of power during the Howard govt. “Woops!” he said jokingly.
The National Civic Council and its ilk live on and have major influence within the ALP. Conroy would like us to think the ALP is being held over a barrel by the lone Family First Senator Steve Fielding, but behind closed doors they may well be the best of pals.
Senator Conroy has done an interview on ITnews http://www.itnews.com.au/News/163364,podcast-conroy-explains-his-net-censorship-regime.aspx in which he said, “What we’re proposing to mandatorily block is not the ACMA blacklist. We’re only blocking material that is illegal in libraries, in news agents, you can’t buy it in book stores, you can’t buy a DVD of it, you can’t watch it on television and you can’t watch it on the cinema. And importantly, it is currently illegal to have it on Australian ISPs.”
The classification of Film, Publications and Computer Games are all different – see here http://www.comlaw.gov.au/ComLaw/Legislation/LegislativeInstrument1.nsf/0/A9975715C45E4DE8CA25700D002EF639/$file/Code+26+May_to+attach.pdf Prohibited Content on the Internet is covered by Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Bill 1999 an explanation of this is available at http://www.efa.org.au/Issues/Censor/cens1.html#prohib
Interestingly, despite the Ministers claim, “Prohibited Content” is not necessarily “illegal” (some may be under State Law) the remedy for “Prohibited Content” is either a take down notice if hosted in Australia or addition to the Black List if hosted overseas. There are no criminal sanctions imposed so, from the Commonwealth perspective, it is not illegal. It seems that again the Minister doesn’t understand this issue or is deliberately being misleading.
Will this stupidity never end?
If Stephen Conroy were put in charge of shark-netting Australian beaches, he’d stick a ten-foot-wide piece of net a mile off Coogee Beach, and if anyone pointed out practical problems with his approach, he’d scream they were “pro-shark”.
Then when Nanna goes to splash her toes into the water and is startled by a kipper, she can ring up Australian Communications, Media and Fishes Authority and they can put that individual fish on the super secret unwanted fishes list.
Please read and contribute – Filter opponents: change tactics or fail
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2778257.htm
Given the latest article from Senator Conroy:
http://www.crikey.com.au/2009/12/23/stephen-conroy-dear-crikey-heres-why-youre-wrong/
I’m not particularly confident that any discussion here will be given any consideration by the ALP or the Senator.
He continues to mislead and confuse, and assume that anyone opposed to the filter has been misled by inaccurate articles when his own article contains many more inaccuracies than any he cites.
Both Colin Jacobs and Stilgherrian deserve a formal apology for allegations made in the article which have since been proven false, and Mark Newton still deserves an apology for the department’s bullying tactics towards opposing viewpoints.
We have on one front an apparent willingness to consider opposing viewpoints and take reasonable action, but the minister himself is well and truly running in the opposite direction. This isn’t looking even remotely promising.
Crikey has a follow-up article from yours truly. Not sure if they’ll put it on the website during their hiatus or wait ’til they start publishing again.
Well – all these opposing comments to the filter? What next Katy?
We are supposed to be grateful for you listening to us and having an open blog. This is the least we should expect from ALL our Senators, in a democratic society, where you listen to and represent the people in a transparent fashion.
Please ask ALL your fellow Senators to have open Blogs? Not to hide behind media statements – so yesterday!
Are all these comments to be ignored? Is this blog just for people to let off steam, and you pay lip service? As you have already stated:
“I will be bound by Labor Caucus”
What will you tell the people on this blog when you have voted for the filter because you were “bound by Labor Caucus”?
(I shot the Jewish women holding their children, because ‘I was bound by the Nazi Caucus’)!
There just seems no hope in your blog, as you have already effectively told us you will be voting for the filter.