Government set to block 'undesireable' internet site

[Frazz]

Opinion; IT SOUNDS entirely defensible, at first. The federal Government plans to protect unwary children by blocking violence and pornography on the internet.

 

The Government's plan, overseen by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, would require internet service providers (ISPs) to block undesirable sites on computers accessed by all Australians.

 

A seething Dr Roger Clarke, chair of the Australian Privacy Foundation, bluntly described the proposal as "stupid and inappropriate".

 

He said not only was it unworkable, but it was a sinister blow to an individual's rights to use the internet without censorship.

 

"Not only will it not work, it is quite dangerous to let the Government censor the net and take control out of the hands of parents," Clarke said.

 

"It is an inappropriate thing for them to be doing. Mr Conroy is like a schoolmaster playing god with the Australian population, all because of the dominance of a moral minority."

 

Conroy's view is that the legislation - compared by critics to Chinese-style internet censorship - will only render unseen the most vile and extreme sites.

 

"Labor makes no apologies to those that argue that any regulation on the internet is like going down the Chinese road," Conroy said.

 

"If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd Labor Government is going to disagree."

 

One problem for the Government is that blocking child porn may unintentionally block acceptable sites.

 

The history of the internet is full of such examples; one blogger found that, due to spamware set to block ads for sex drug Cialis, he was unable to publish the word "socialist".

 

And, if it is disingenuous to compare Labor's policy to China's malevolent control over web access to its citizens, it is equally disingenuous of Rudd's Government to claim the issue simply relates to child pornography.

 

There are genuine concerns that the Government - backed by morals groups like Family First - will in time extend the powers outside of their intended target area.

 

Also of concern is that, under the Government's plan, users would be permitted to "opt out" of the scheme - and might therefore find themselves listed as possible deviants.

 

Service providers fear any legislation would be "the thin end of the wedge", heralding widespread censorship. Besides, what evidence is there that young children using the web are regularly stumbling across child pornography?

 

On a practical level, ISPs fear the mass blocking of sites could slow internet speeds and cost millions of dollars to implement.

 

Sites identified by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) would be "blacklisted" and then blocked by the servers.

 

The ability for download speeds to be maintained would depend on the exact number of sites blocked - it is suspected around 2000 sites could cause problems.

 

A user typing in the address would be sent to an error page or possibly - as in Scandinavia - redirected to a police page.

Author:Galen English

Date: January 02, 2008

Source: Australian IT News .com.au ; http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/...0-15306,00.html

Copyright: Copyright 2007 News Limited.

 

Sure im all for stopping child explotation but if these measures are accepted it may be taken that other web sites that condone illegal behaviour should also be blocked ... personelly i hate any form of censorship

 

[postman]

They forgot about proxies.

[iamnotacop]

Also of concern is that, under the Government's plan, users would be permitted to "opt out" of the scheme - and might therefore find themselves listed as possible deviants.

 

This was my point on another thread involving the web sensoring and also web and mobile phone tracking laws.

 

They could also use it to block people from other peoples views about the political parties.

 

Fuck it, I think it is wrong, I thought it was wrong when the Chinese did it and it is wrong if we do it.

 

 

If they know of a couple of thousand "child porn" sites, then why don't they set up an international task force to arrest the sick fuckers???

 

On another point, I downloaded one of the Internet filters from the Governments website and it included blocking things such as this site and other drug related sites (with my kids we couldn't even access a website to determine the sex of chickens). Needless to say I took it off my computer, although there was a bit where you could unblock access, but that is not the point. My point was that maybe during routine updates they could see what was unblocked and that could set off a 'trigger' for them to study my surfing habits.

[nugget]

They forgot about proxies.

 

 

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong but I think a proxy will be just as helpful as a pinch of shit when it comes to blocking at the ISP level

 

 

[Zaknefain]

They didnt forget proxies, proxies hide your ip adress...

 

 

i dont think i need to explain more, but i will anyways.

 

 

Internet Service Providers provide internet service to you; it goes through them and then to you, and the would like to block the content as it enters the servers of the Internet Service Providers. This is not do-able, but yet it is do-able; it is equivalent, nearly, to prohibition, but of even more difficulty since content is easily masked. In fact, it would be so incredibly expensive to, moderately, properly do such a thing that the Australian Government would go bankrupt. To remove violence and pornography cometely from the internet is not possible, and this is what they are wanting to do. Screw them, they are clearly idiots; we can see how it doesn't work, the so called common people, and our leaders cannot. This speaks clearly of the idiocy permeating our countries, and yet we non-violently and most often passively accept the annoyance. Look at the people in the Middle East; countries that have been there for years and years that have strong cultural and religious believe strongly engraved into their minds, dictating choices and opinions, acting as though they are brainwashed because we can clearly see what little sense they make moreover that is what they feel is right, no matter how strange that 'rightness' is, and they fight for it! They fight and call for murder and march in the streets over their false gods. They take their culture and religion so seriously that they give up their lives in Jihad to serve their cause. They will march outside buildings with machetes, blind in bloodlust and anger, because someone named a childs toy Muhammid! YET WE WILL NOT STAND UP WHEN THE GOVERNMENT TRIES TO TAKE AWAY OUR FREE CHOICE! We will not even stand up for that which is much more important than a false god, or a toy named as a prophet! We will not stand up for our freedom; the only thing that counts in our lives today. The freedom to make our own conscious decisions under the law. Will not even stand for the only thing that matters.

 

Isn't it sad?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry for my uneducated ramblings, I didn't even proof read that

[iamnotacop]

If you rented a server in say Russia, could you set up a connection between you (a linux box with proxy server and encryption software) and it, and encrypt all data going through, wouldn't that disguise it from the ISP? Maybe someone like Pure can answer, he knows his IT shit.

 

But I spose even talking about it may mean you are a deviant in their eyes. sigh

[Stoney]

hey there all

 

i can see there point in regards to children and the internet but i mean come on there is no need to go the lengths that they are talkin about here. Simply some sort of id check to access the full internet would be much easier but then that opens another can of worms as im sure there would be a way to track what sites certain people frequent as it will have them logged on with there id.

 

Kids dont need to see porn all the time and it dont matter how good a filter you have you can still access porn and sites that young kids just dont need to see. Dont get me wrong i saw my first porn at the tender age of 12 and im a very normal person

 

But still cant believe that they are trying to go this way about it. Clearly censorship and clearly our goverment dont really care about our rights as citizens

 

cheerz

[postman]

SEDITION LAWS IN AUSTRALIA

 

http://www.artslaw.com.au/LegalInformation...ion/default.asp

 

 

The sedition offences are contained in the Anti -Terrorism Act (No 2) 2005 (Cth). Under the changes to the law, statements and acts that condone the use of violence against Australians and its institutions could lead to seven years imprisonment. This information sheet provides an overview of the new sedition laws and the debate surrounding the new legislation.

What is sedition?

 

The classic definition of sedition is that it is a political crime that punishes certain communications critical of the established order. Sedition crimes have been enshrined in state and territory based Australian laws since before federation and inserted into the Commonwealth Crimes Act in 1920. Under the Commonwealth Act, seditious behaviour that intended to: (i) bring the government into hatred or contempt; (ii) excite disaffection against the government, constitution, UK parliament and Kings Dominions; and (iii) bring about change to those institutions unlawfully, was criminalised.

 

The definition of ‘sedition’ and ‘seditious intention’ is central to the debate surrounding recent reforms to the old sedition laws in Australia. Those who are critical of the changes argue that the term ‘sedition’ in the reformed legislation is a misnomer, as some of the key reforms do not fall within the classic definition of ‘sedition’ at all.

The specifics of the new offences

 

In 2005 the Federal Government argued that the reasons for revitalising the sedition offences were to: (i) prevent terrorism; (ii) protect the integrity of the electoral process; (iii) protect public order from threats posed by inter-group violence; and (iv) prevent seditious or treasonous speech in the classic sense.

 

The reforms replace the old sedition laws with five new offences:

1. Urging Interference in Parliamentary Elections

 

A person commits an offence if the person urges another person to interfere by force or violence with lawful processes for an election of a member or members of a House of the Parliament. The penalty for this offence has increased from three to five years and can be committed by anyone anywhere in the world regardless of where the interference takes place.

2. Urging Violence within the Community

 

A person commits an offence if: (a) the person urges a group or groups (whether distinguished by race, religion, nationality or political opinion) to use force or violence against another group or other groups; and ( the use of the force or violence would threaten the peace, order and good government of the Commonwealth. Each of these provisions requires the offender to encourage an act of force or violence. A person arguably falls foul of this provision if, for example, the person is a member of a racial minority group that is the victim of violence by white supremacists and urges members of their group to forcefully resist the white supremacists. A possible outcome of such resistance would be some degree of street violence or race violence.

Treason and treachery

 

The following three offences are often described as ‘urging treason and urging treachery’. Importantly, the offender need only urge treasonous conduct, rather than intend both treasonous conduct and treasonous intentions on the part of others.

3. Urging the overthrow of the Constitution or Government

 

A person commits an offence if the person urges another person to overthrow by force or violence: (a) the Constitution; ( the Government of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory; or © the lawful authority of the Government of the Commonwealth.

4. Urging a person to assist the enemy

 

A person commits an offence if: (a) the person urges another person to engage in conduct; and ( the first-mentioned person intends the conduct to assist, by any means whatever, an organisation or country; and © the organisation or country is:(i) at war with the Commonwealth, whether or not the existence of a state of war has been declared; and (ii) specified by Proclamation to be an enemy at war with the Commonwealth.

5. Urging a person to assist those engaged in armed hostilities

 

A person commits an offence if: (a) the person urges another person to engage in conduct; and ( the first-mentioned person intends the conduct to assist, by any means whatever, an organisation or country; and © the organisation or country is engaged in armed hostilities against the Australian Defence Force.

 

To give an example of an application of the above provisions, a person who urged Australian soldiers and their allies to lay down their arms and refuse to fight, would be urging persons to engage in conduct that: (i) would assist a country at war with Australia, and (ii) assist a country engaged in armed hostilities with the Australian Defence

Force. This pacifist would possibly be committing an offence under the Act.

 

For the offences contained within the sedition provisions the penalty is imprisonment for up to seven years. Of the above five offences, the additional element of ‘recklessness’ applies to the first three. Recklessness under the criminal legislation requires that the person consciously considers the risks involved and nevertheless proceeds with the conduct.

Defences to sedition offences

 

The good faith defences provided for in the Sedition provisions may apply when the offending material points out mistakes of political leaders or errors in governments, the constitution, laws and courts with a view of reforming these errors, or expression that points out issues causing hostility between groups. The defences also protect lawful attempts to change the law, any speech in connection with an industrial matter and the publication of a report or commentary on a matter of public interest.

Limitations of the Defences

 

In reality the good faith defences, as they are currently drafted, only protect a very specific form of political expression and have the potential to restrict freedom of speech and impact on artistic expression. In particular, the good faith defences do not specifically extend to artistic expression aimed at the promotion of discussion or the presentation of a different view.

 

Arts Law advocates that there should be a specific defence which expressly provides a defence for all forms of artistic expression. For example, the Anti - Discrimination Act 1977 (NSW) protects statements made reasonably and in good faith for academic, artistic, scientific, research, or public interest purposes. The Commonwealth Racial Discrimination Act 1975 expressly protects statements and acts done reasonably and in good faith in relation to artistic works and activities.

Debate surrounding the new legislation and specific ramifications for the arts

 

The sedition reforms have been met with a wave of criticism for a number of reasons. The Australian Law Reform Commission has stated that the new offences attempt to shift the focus away from mere speech towards ‘urging’ other people to use ‘force or violence’ in a number of specific contexts. One of the key concerns identified is that there is no definition of ‘urging’. It will be the role of the courts to give greater clarity to its definition and limits.

 

Some individuals and organisations argue that when artists are faced with the prospect of breaching the law, particularly if it carries the threat of up to seven years imprisonment, they may err on the side of caution and self-censor. Arguably the most insidious thing about self censorship is that it is impossible to measure or quantify because it is an act of restraint. Even if these laws have not yet been used against artists, the fact that they may be, has an effect on the artistic output of many arts professionals. The change may not be immediately recognizable, but the cumulative effect will be reflected in the content and diversity of artistic expression available to the public.

 

Other commentators also suggest that artists and arts organisations who have previously engaged in work that challenges contemporary orthodoxies, have dealt with controversial themes and opinions or have produced satirical or metaphorical work are likely to be the most affected by the sedition provisions. Often these works are aimed at providing social commentary or criticism and may be open to multiple subjective responses. Artists risk facing prosecution for a sedition offence if the work or performance influences people or just one person in a certain way. If numerous meanings can be drawn from a creative work, under the sedition provisions which allow for ‘reckless urging’, there is a risk that an artist may be prosecuted for someone else’s interpretation of the work, even if that interpretation was unintended.

More information

 

Click here to view pdf of the talk Seditious Intent given by Jusitce Elizabeth Evatt AO, ICJ Commissioner at the Seditious Intenent Short Film Collection launch at NSW Parliment House, 24 May 2006

Arts Law Centre of Australia

 

If you have any further inquiries about the new legislation and how it impacts on your arts practice please contact the Arts Law Centre of Australia. In addition, if you have ever been informed by an individual or organisation that you are in breach of the sedition provisions of the Anti - Terrorism Act (No 2) 2005 (Cth) please contact Arts Law. In order to keep the Federal government aware of the practical implications of new laws it is also important to inform the Australian Law Reform Commission of any interaction that you may have with the legislation.

[Al B. Fuct]

Yes indeed, the govt hasn't figured on proxies- nor Tor. To halt access to objectionable sites the govt would have to identify and ban every proxy and Tor node. It's all a total wank to please some far-right political interests. Completely impossible in a functional sense.

 

Remember the kid who beat the govt's nanny filter in 30 min? Any one of us can do it in 3. Just install Tor.

 

I'm not annoyed, I'm amused. When Sen Conroy claims to have his censor-bot operating, it'll be gut-busting fun to point out to media that it doesn't fucking work.

 

Mind you, the govt will probably keep the list of banned sites secret. You likely won't be able to get a list of sites the govt doesn't want you to see. Catch-22? Yep.

[Frazz]

Well its reassuring to hear from the educated folk that these measures can be easily overcome , not for the child porn stuff ...

but for arguements sake if they ever decided to block OzStoners , well we could all hook up to this Tor and it would be ok .. is that right ?

... never mind its over my head if it doesnt grow in a garden