Despite months of lobbying, a Google and iiNet-backed industry group, the Safer Internet Group (SIG), has been unsuccessful in meeting with the communications minister, Stephen Conroy, to discuss their alternative to the Government’s proposed mandatory ISP-filter.
iiNet has taken a swing at the Federal Government’s mandatory ISP-level filter, calling it an “ideological approach aimed at a political objective”.
If the level of industry feedback on the Federal Government’s measures to increase accountability and transparency for Refused Classification (RC) material is anything to go by, then it’s safe to say ISPs have effectively chosen to filter out the exercise as a waste of time.
New Zealand’s opt-in Internet content filter has gone live today with a least two confirmed participating ISPs. The government-run and operated scheme was quietly turned on early last month as a soft launch.
The U.S., Europe and other countries are secretly drawing up rules designed to crack down on copyright abuse on the Internet, in part by making ISPs liable for illegal content, according to a copy of part of the confidential draft agreement that was seen by the IDG News Service.
The comments came quick, fast and furiously last week after the Federal Government decided it would go ahead with its much-criticised ISP-level Internet content filter. There wasn’t a news site that didn’t receive a rush of posts – most highly charged and negative on the plan. Here are a few we thought worth of a second mention:
The chorus of voices critiquing the Federal Government’s mandatory ISP-level filtering plans has grown larger with the Greens and Electronic Frontiers Australia joining the likes of the Federal Opposition and Google in opposing the filter.
The Federal Government will introduce legislative amendments to the Broadcasting Services Act to require all ISPs to block Refused Classification (RC)-rated material hosted on overseas servers.
After much delay the Federal Government has released the results of Enex TestLab’s test pilot into mandatory ISP-level content filtering, finding that a technically competent user could circumvent filtering technology based on ACMA’s blacklist.
Last week we revealed the iPhone had taken out the Computerworld Top 10 Most Influential for 2009. The smartphone topped a list of remarkable people, products, organisations, trends and events that greatly influenced the ICT industry and community over the course of 2009.