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Unless you have been living under a rock for the past 6 months, you have no doubt heard the hype, that this will prevent the spread of child pornography, and make the internet a safer place for all Australians who will mange to avoid all the nasty stuff that is out there. The spin tells us that only material that is refused classification in Australia will be filtered and blocked and that anyone who opposes this must, by default have no interest in protecting children from exploitation.
As most law enforcement agencies are well aware, the majority of child porn is not spread through designated public websites, but through peer to peer networking groups, which are far more difficult to locate, track and shut down. The content in such networks is not held on any one single computer, but shared between all the users. There is no single identifiable address that can be targeted. In short, this filter will, effectively, do nothing to stop the trade in such content. The alternative suggestion of packet snooping might work a little better and be more effective at combating this problem, but the trade off is that every single thing you view, send, or examine on the internet would then be open for observation and stored. In short Big Brother would be watching every move, email, and site you are involved with and internet privacy would be a thing of the past. Packet snooping is virtually installing a digital camera inside every computer in the country to watch its users at all times. As nobody is beyond corruption, that means all of your private details would be open to exploitation. It would be a hackers dream toy as well, and considering that not even the white house, or the American military have been able to completely secure their networks against hackers, we cannot possibly guarantee the security of any packet snooping network or database. In short, both systems fail to protect children, though the second method has the added risk to not only personal security, but national security as well.
Outside of this though, I believe there are far more worrying concerns about the types of things that are going to be blocked. Watching the ABC last night I noticed that aged persons groups are now getting training in how to get around the filter so that they will continue to have access to information that might help them end their own lives with dignity, should the need ever arise.
Young people experimenting with drugs are also able to find a wealth of information that might just save their lives at the moment by sourcing websites that provide accurate information about what drugs can do, potential side effect, other risks, etc. These kinds of sites would also be blocked. Ignorance is no protection when what is required is information. We are not going to stop people trying various substances, but we can at least ensure that they are doing so as safely as is possible. Censorship has never worked in the past and it will not stop people trying drugs in the future.
Australia has never been the most progressive country in the world when it comes to free flow of information and our classification board can sometimes be overly protective, so the risk is that many quite harmless things could find their way into a refused classification structure and be blocked. Naturally we would not have access to any list of websites that are in fact blocked, and the reason for this is because the government knows just how easy it would be for the average user to get around such restrictions. Such secrecy almost proves the fact that the filter will not work.
We also have a problem that could arise under this plan. Consider the fact that a social networking site such as twitter or facebook is made up by the contributions of millions of people from all corners of the world, people with very diverse interests. These people could be discussing things like drug use or euthanasia, and the parts of the world where they are living allow these things to be employed without penalty. The filter would be unable to simply block a single user, or even a group of users, and so will we then see social networking sites closed down and blocked for access by Australians? This is definitely a very real possibility as simply complaining to the owners of such websites would not necessarily result in accounts that discuss those things being closed, especially as the person may not be breaking any laws in their own country.
The bottom line though is that this is going to cost a great deal of money to set up, monitor, and run. The expense is going to return absolutely no protection to the people of Australia, can be easily circumvented, and may well slow down internet speeds in a country that already lags behind much of the world in that area.
Many people are apparently confused by the continual talk of just how easy something like this would be to get around. Perhaps 5 minutes spent looking at the tools and information available through the Global Internet Freedom Consortium would help, or simply research the word "proxy".
With the fear of opening a gigantic can of worms here, would be interested in the thoughts of others???
