Opposition scores win over ISP filter report release?

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Tuesday, 23 December 2008 12:29

IT Industry - Strategy

Earlier this morning, Australian Shadow Minister for Communications, Senator Nick Minchin, put out a press release accusing the Minister for Communications, Senator Stephen Conroy, of “burying” a report into ISP filtering – but surprise, surprise, the report is now available for anyone to read.

The news concerning Internet filtering and censorship in Australia just keeps getting worse, with the Federal Government now proposing to include (P2P) peer-to-peer and BitTorrent into the filtering trial, something that could greatly impact on legitimate uses of these services.

There are also reports that ISPs such as iiNet, who have volunteered to be part of the ISP filtering trial, haven’t yet received any instructions from the Government on how to participate, despite the Government saying it wanted the trial to start before the end of 2008, a date that draws ever closer with each passing day.

It’s also a date that has now been scrapped entirely, with the live filtering trial now due to begin in mid-January, as noted on page 2.

Earlier this morning, Australia’s Shadow Minister for Communications, Senator Nick Minchin, put out a release demanding that “Communications Minister Stephen Conroy should today publicly release an expert study, which he has kept buried since February, and is reportedly damning of the type of Internet Service Provider (ISP) level filtering being proposed by [the Federal] Labor [Government].”

Details of where the report can be found are on page 2, as the report has now been released, but what Senator Minchin had to say sounds pretty damning, and is worth reading.

This morning, Senator Minchin said: “It would seem the report, 'Feasibility Study of ISP Level Content Filtering', which was a joint Government and industry initiative, has been kept secret because it casts further serious doubts over the centralised Internet filtering system that Senator Conroy is looking to mandate.”

Senator Minchin’s statement noted that the report said “centralised mandatory filtering will "significantly slow Internet speeds", inadvertently block acceptable content and be ineffective against peer-to-peer file sharing networks, chat rooms, email and instant messaging.”

In addition, the report said: “entire user-generated content sites such as YouTube and Wikipedia could be blocked because of a single suspect posting.”

Senator Minchin said: "The fact Senator Conroy has kept this expert study buried for 10 months, during a period when debate has been raging about Labor's divisive and deeply unpopular plan to introduce mandatory, ISP-level filtering, is extraordinary and totally unacceptable”, and Senator Minchin has tried getting the report released “under Freedom of Information” rules.

Senator Minchin continued: “It would appear this report has not been released, simply because it raises further serious and legitimate technical concerns about Labor's policy. While many questions have been asked of the Minister over several months, Senator Conroy has been deliberately evasive, vague and cryptic about the detail of this controversial proposal.

"This comes when serious doubts are also being cast over the credibility and efficacy of the Government's planned 'live' filtering trials which are having trouble getting off the ground because of a lack of support.

"It must also be highlighted that on 31 December the Rudd Labor Government will recklessly close the online safety program established by the previous Coalition Government, which sees Australian families given the option of obtaining free, PC-level filters, which can be tailored to the needs of individual households," Senator Minchin concluded.

However, surprise surprise – the report is now available, with full details from a media release by Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, on page 2. Please read on.