[LINK] more come out against net censorship = DPP NSW

Jan Whitaker jwhit at janwhitaker.com
Thu Aug 6 16:37:25 AEST 2009


http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/dpp-blasts-net-censor-plan-20090805-e9mq.html
DPP blasts net censor plan
Asher Moses
August 5, 2009

The NSW Director of Public Prosecutions has slammed the Federal 
Government's internet censorship policy, saying it will have very 
limited, if any, success in achieving its aims.

Nicholas Cowdery, QC, made the comments in response to a question 
from a journalist at a conference on e-crime in Sydney yesterday.

"Crime prevention methods need to be practical ... I'm not an expert 
in the field, but talk of filters, blocking mechanisms and all of 
that sort of thing, I think, ultimately, in a society like ours, are 
going to have very limited, if any, success in achieving the aims 
that their proponents set out for them," he said.

The Government plans to implement mandatory filters in ISPs that 
would block, for all Australians, sites that have been "refused 
classification" by Australian regulators.

This includes child sexual-abuse imagery, bestiality and sexual 
violence material but also content that is perfectly legal to view in 
Australia, such as regular gay and straight pornography, and innocent 
sites that have been added to the secret blacklist by mistake.

Experts have long warned that filters would inevitably block innocent 
sites and also inadvertently let through nasty sites, and these 
concerns became reality last month when it was revealed a year 10 
student searching for information about the swallow bird was instead 
presented with hardcore pornography.

Despite surfing the web with internet filtering mechanisms installed 
by the Department of Education and Training, the student was unable 
to view harmless sites such as the Education Minister Verity Firth's 
own website.

In further written comments made to this website today, Cowdery 
questioned whether an internet filtering scheme would help him catch 
and prosecute more criminals such as child porn traders. He said 
compromises to freedom of expression would also need to be considered.

People looking to view banned material on the web would probably be 
able to bypass the filters, while those peddling material such as 
child porn would most likely change their tactics to avoid detection 
by the filters.

"Theoretically an internet filtering scheme could capture and 
facilitate the proof of criminal offending [e-crime] on the internet 
- at least on the 'supply side'," he said.

"But it is unlikely that such persons, once they know that such a 
scheme is in place, would continue to expose themselves to the risk 
of detection in that way."

Previously, communications experts have said that simply trading 
illegal images over peer-to-peer software, instead of via web pages, 
would be all it would take to bypass the ISP filters.

And those determined to view banned material on web pages could evade 
the filtering by accessing the internet through an encrypted proxy server.

Cowdery said some other issues that needed to be considered before 
implementing mandatory filtering included the level of offending, the 
ability of such a measure to prevent or reduce such offending, the 
costs of introducing filtering and "the compromises that would need 
to be made to the freedom of expression and freedom of association in 
an open democratic society such as Australia".

"Especially where such compromises would be unpopular and not broadly 
acceptable to the community, there would be an incentive for persons 
to avoid or thwart such a measure and to explore and implement such 
avoidance," Cowdery said.

"With the present and probably future state of the technology of the 
internet, it seems likely that such avoidance could be achieved and 
that would reduce the effectiveness of internet filtering accordingly."

A group of mainly smaller internet providers are now finishing their 
trials of the Government's internet filtering scheme and 
Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has said he expected to 
release results within weeks.

Senator Conroy has said the results will determine whether the 
Government proceeds with the controversial election policy.

He said there was no silver bullet to protecting children online and 
that the internet filtering scheme would be complemented by ramped-up 
law enforcement.

The policy is opposed by web user groups, communications experts, 
most political parties, the Australian Library and Information 
Association and even some child-welfare groups, who say education is 
the key to protecting children online.

Last month, the British ISP industry awarded Senator Conroy its 
annual "internet villain of the year award" for his internet censorship policy.


Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
jwhit at janwhitaker.com
blog: http://janwhitaker.com/jansblog/
business: http://www.janwhitaker.com

Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or 
sing or write, for only in such response do we find truth.
~Madeline L'Engle, writer

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