Australian Net Filtering Plan Delayed - Government misses their own deadline on project...
Links: home · search · speed test · login · more ·
Australian Net Filtering Plan Delayed
Government misses their own deadline on project...
(old news - 11:13AM Sunday Dec 28 2008)
tags: legal · hardware · world · content · networking
The Australian government's $125.8 million plan to filter the Internet of all nasty bits appears to be delayed until mid-January. The plan, one of the most elaborate and expensive filtration efforts ever attempted, will include two blacklists -- one which filters illegal material (no opt-out) and another that filters material deemed offensive by the Australian government (users can opt out). The nation's largest ISP, iiNet, has said they'll participate -- but only to clearly illustrate to the Australian government how technically impossible and "stupid" the program is. Opponents are noting that early tests show potential 'net slowdowns between 20-70% should the filters be applied.

Related:
  1. ISPs Being Pressured To Become Piracy Cops
  2. Danish Pirate Bay Block Actually Increased Website Traffic
  3. Swiss Bank, CA Court Censor Whistleblower Website
  4. P2P Filters Not Ready For Prime Time
  5. Virgin Takes Aim At BitTorrent
  6. Tuesday Evening Links
  7. Wednesday Evening Links
  8. Iran's Internet Censorship Creates Deep Packet Firestorm
Links: New Topic
Forums »

TKJunkMail @ 28th Dec 12:31PM:
Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

iiNet, has said they'll participate -- but only to clearly illustrate to the Australian government how technically impossible and "stupid" the program is.
It isn't technically impossible. Though in Australia it may be politically impossible. All it takes is the will of the gov't to do it and punish attempts to bypass it. See China & Iran for working filters(not 100%, but very high in compliance by its people).
--
My BLOG .. .. Internet News .. .. My Web Page
Ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya punk?
reply
a333 @ 28th Dec 02:26PM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

Yes, in case you haven't noticed, those can be bypassed in about 5 minutes by any teenager with a brain slightly larger than a peanut... it's called Tor, or an ssh/vpn tunnel.
reply
sholling @ 28th Dec 03:18PM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

It starts with porn, and then eventually the no opt-out filters will extend to politically incorrect thoughts.
reply
Doctor Four @ 28th Dec 07:44PM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

Another thing he likely doesn't know of is the project by the Citizen Lab of the University of Toronto, Psiphon. Though that's mainly directed at web access, and not p2p.

But anyway, VPNs, proxies, and so on are going to get extremely popular down under once the filters are implemented.
--
"The trouble with computers, of course, is that they are very sophisticated idiots." - Doctor Who (from Robot)

reply
Corydon @ 29th Dec 02:44AM:
Meanwhile in the UK...

Culture minister Andy Burnham wants to rate everything on the web. Yeah, that's a really good idea. Google has said that the web hit one trillion URLs this year, with several billion more added each day.

Here's the kicker:
"If you look back at the people who created the Internet they talked very deliberately about creating a space that governments couldn't reach," Burnham told The Telegraph. "I think we are having to revisit that stuff seriously now."

He said some content should not be available to be viewed. "This is not a campaign against free speech, far from it; it is simply there is a wider public interest at stake when it involves harm to other people. We have got to get better at defining where the public interest lies and being clear about it." [Emphasis added]
Cognitive dissonance anyone?

Oh and he wants to negotiate with Obama to bring it to the US too.

Link.
--
"2 Strangers + 1 20 minute ceremony + $50 + 10 shots of tequila = Holy Matrimony and 1st Class Protections Under the Law… now that’s crazy!"
reply
Corydon @ 29th Dec 03:01AM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

Both have their limitations, and also presume that there are countries that do not participate in the restrictions. When even countries that have fairly robust free speech traditions (like the US) can prosecute you for publishing software that might be used by a third party for illegal purposes (what was that that the NRA used to say about guns?) then it's a logical step to banning the methods used to subvert the blocks.

Also, the Internet is about making information freely available from as many people to as many people as possible. But if I need to jump through hoops (use Tor or whatever) to get to site A, whereas site B just works with my browser, then many, many people just won't bother and will for all intents and purposes lose access to site A.
--
"2 Strangers + 1 20 minute ceremony + $50 + 10 shots of tequila = Holy Matrimony and 1st Class Protections Under the Law… now that’s crazy!"
reply
KrK @ 29th Dec 05:02AM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

said by TKJunkMail :

See China & Iran for working filters(not 100%, but very high in compliance by its people).
Only officially, publicly. It's actually very high non-compliance by the citizenry privately.

It's also why there's a huge market for satellite receivers and such. They use them to pickup foreign "uncensored" content; including western programming.
--
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini

reply
Kearnstd @ 29th Dec 07:59AM:
Re: Great Firewall of China blocks most of what it wants blocked

said by TKJunkMail :

iiNet, has said they'll participate -- but only to clearly illustrate to the Australian government how technically impossible and "stupid" the program is.
It isn't technically impossible. Though in Australia it may be politically impossible. All it takes is the will of the gov't to do it and punish attempts to bypass it. See China & Iran for working filters(not 100%, but very high in compliance by its people).
the difference is that China and Iran will shoot, hang, throw to the lions, Torture anyone who breaks their rules because human rights are non existant in their justice systems.
--
[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports
reply
anon @ 29th Dec 08:53AM:
msg deleted

deleted by a moderator
reply

Thank you for using lo-fi dslreports.com - report bugs
© 99-2009 silver matrix LLC