[LINK] Rudd Government's internet filter to block up to 10, 000 'unwanted' sites

[rene]

On Thu, 13 Nov 2008 14:28:36 +1100, Rick Welykochy wrote:

> Bernard Robertson-Dunn wrote:
>
>> Rudd Government's internet filter to block up to 10,000 'unwanted'
>> sites By Jennifer Dudley-Nicholson
>>
>
> [SNIP]
>
>> "The pilot will specifically test filtering against the ACMA
>> blacklist of prohibited content, which is mostly child pornography,
>> as well as filtering of other unwanted content," Senator Conroy told
>> Parliament.
>>
>
> It is hard to believe that the ACMA is aware of child porn web (or
> other) sites on the net and no action has been taken to prosecute.
>
> Has such action been initiated? 

One sometimes wonders. For example, have a look at this ACMA media release 
of 1 Oct 2008
http://www.acma.gov.au/WEB/STANDARD/204876/pc=PC_311406

People on this list who understand about 'domains' and domain registration 
(including the need to pay to register same, generally by credit card or 
cheque, not cash) may wonder, like me, why it appears that all that was 
done was to have Melb IT "prevent the domain names in question from 
directing to the offending sites".

>Support is available world-wide to
> prosecute this sort of thing in any jurisdiction, isn't it?

Yes, subject to the definition 'cp'. Some lobbyists claim there's lots of 
countries with no laws against such material but one needs to pay close 
attention/investigate what they mean by 'cp'. For example, some countries 
(and even some AU State govts) have declined to implement laws banning 
images of persons above the age of consent in their jurisdiction, something 
many lobbyists are not happy about.

> It is also hard to believe that child porn is on the web. I would have
> thought that these creeps would be using encrypted private P2P networks
> and/or Tor to share their poison.

The perception that it is, or at least that there is lots of it, on the Web 
is enhanced by extremely poor media reporting particularly in Australia. 
Too many journalists think Internet = Web. So when the media reports 
massive 'c/porn ring' caught etc, as for example in the cases of Operation 
Achilles (Mar 2008) and Operation Lobate (mid 2007), they talk about web 
sites. Investigating o/s media reports and US indictments and FBI 
affidavits etc shows that those cases had nothing to do with the Web. The 
former concerned the posting of PGP encrypted files into Usenet newsgroups 
with innocuous group names, and the latter concerned a P2P (WinMX) hosted 
chat room with associated P2P file sharing system.

As is probably obvious to most people on this list, Labor's blocking plan 
would not hamper such people in any way.

> The above statement rings of fallacious lobbying of the worst kind,
> i.e. that based on disinformation.
>
> As for "other unwanted content"? What does that flippant and smug
> remark mean? "unwanted' needs to be defined.
>
> But then again, why even weigh into the debate from this angle? The
> whole thing is a political schmozzle that will fail and serve no real
> purpose other than to further the politicking of some seriously mislead
> people.

And give inadequately informed members of the public the impression that 
the 'cp' problem is solved because, well, the government says it's blocked, 
notwithstanding that all indications are that so-called 'blocking' of web 
sites will have no effect whatsoever on the ability of people who traffick 
in child sexual abuse material to continue to do so.

Irene