The Australian Internet Industry Association (IIA) is updating its Family Friendly Internet Filter list with new products after testing by Enex Testlab.
The IIA list is aimed at providing parents a range of PC-level filters that block undesirable websites and pop-ups, while allowing them to set up passwords and monitor chat rooms.
Additionally, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) that want to obtain the IIA's family friendly ISP branding must provide access to one of these filters.
So far, seven products have passed the tests conducted by the same outfit that did the Federal Government's controversial ISP-level filter pilot – Enex Testlab.
These are: Safe Eyes, v 4.3 for PC; Safe Eyes, v 4.3 for Mac; F-secure Protection Service for Consumers v 6.15; Optus Internet Security Suite (enabled by F-Secure); Puresight PC v 6.1.88; Symantec Online Family Norton v 4.0; and Trend Micro PC-Cillin Internet Security.
Three other products are still undergoing tests – ContentKeeper Web v.123, Optenet PC filter v 9.4.1, and My Child My Values Filterpak v 7.7.
At the time of publication the IIA's Web site showed 14 products as having achieved the certification last round. Six of these have decided to exit the certification program while another, Net Nanny, may still be re-tested.
"It is an ongoing project, which has been running for five or six years," Enex Testlab managing director, Matt Tett, said. "It came out of the early tests we were doing for NetAlert in Tasmania when the laws were first past. The Internet Industry Association stood up and said they want to soft regulate and have their own program that they administer themselves. They acknowledged the need to verify these PC-based products to make sure they were accurate in their ability to block the black list, which is the primary list that ACMA controls."
The three groups work together to test the PC-based content filters.
"I think we have had maybe 11 to 15 participants at any one time which are registered. The Internet service providers register as a family friendly ISP and they provide a link on their website to the IIA site which has a list of the filters performance and their results," Tett said. "End users have the ability to download those filters, install them and set them up to protect their families with some level of assurance the filter is accurate."
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