Internet censorship in Australia
In October 2008, a policy extending Internet censorship to a system of mandatory filtering of overseas websites which are, or potentially would be, "refused classification" (RC) in Australia was proposed.
In December 2016, the Federal Court of Australia ordered more than fifty ISPs to censor 5 sites that infringe on the Copyright Act after rights holders, Roadshow Films, Foxtel, Disney, Paramount, Columbia and the 20th Century Fox companies filed a lawsuit.
[23] The Green Left Weekly stated these were Melbourne Indymedia and S11 websites, and that the Australian Broadcasting Authority (the predecessor to ACMA) cleared them of breaching government regulations on 30 October 2002.
[24] Also in 2002, and under the terms of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975, the Federal Court ordered Fredrick Töben to remove material from his Australian website which denied aspects of the Holocaust and vilified Jews.
Victoria Police deputy commissioner Kieran Walshe had asked the state Director of Public Prosecutions to examine the possibility of removing these blogs from the web, as they might jeopardise any court case.
[31] The then Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, released a statement titled Measures to improve safety of the internet for families,[32] which briefly outlined the proposed purpose and methods of filtering.
The scheme aimed to develop "a package that balances safety for families and the benefits of the digital revolution", and was intended to complement the work of the ACMA by blocking content hosted overseas which is out of the control of Australian authorities.
[67][68][69] In October 2008, the governing Australian Labor Party proposed extending Internet censorship to a system of mandatory filtering of overseas websites which are, or potentially would be, "refused classification" (RC) in Australia.
[90] On 31 December 2007, Stephen Conroy announced the Federal Government's intention to introduce an ISP-based filter to censor "inappropriate material" from the Internet to protect children.
He stated that the filter would only be used to remove "refused classification" (RC) content, using the same rationale as existing television, radio and print publications, and that the Senate could be relied upon to provide rigorous assessment of any proposed legislation.
[102] In February 2009, then opposition communications spokesman Nick Minchin obtained independent legal advice confirming that a mandatory censorship regime would require new legislation.
This has since been retracted as "poorly worded" in a statement from Malcolm Turnbull, who said, "The correct position is that the Coalition will encourage mobile phone and Internet service providers to make available software which parents can choose to install on their own devices to protect their children from inappropriate material.
A spokesman for independent senator Nick Xenophon said: "should the filtering plan go ahead, he would look to use it to block Australians from accessing overseas online casino sites, which are illegal to run in Australia".
Online content prohibited by ACMA includes: In answer to a question in Parliament in October 2008, the government in January 2009 stated that of the 1,370 websites on the blocklist, 674 were related to child pornography, and the remainder would be classified as R18+ and X18+.
[127] EFA analysis of the report showed that:[128][129] In November 2008, the Government hired Melbourne company ENEX TestLab, an RMIT spin-off, to design a live pilot test on a real network.
[133] Communications from Senator Conroy's office have indicated that the live trial will occur without the participation of any customers due to concerns about the impact on network performance of filtering 10,000 URLs.
Testing with each ISP will take place for at least six weeks once filtering equipment has been obtained and installed, and iPrimus expects the trial to begin in late April or early May with five or ten thousand participants.
Stephen Conroy stated, "The report into the pilot trial of ISP-level filtering demonstrates that censoring RC-rated material can be done with 100 percent accuracy and negligible impact on Internet speed".
[citation needed] The results were initially reported as "80pc back web filter: poll" despite the fact that 46% were against "a government body determining whether a website is appropriate to visit".
[148] In July 2010, Justice Minister Robert McClelland ordered the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) to review the criteria for the "refused classification" (RC) category, while also conducting public consultation and evaluating the practices and codes of companies in the sector.
[153] There are concerns that censoring access based on the Interpol blocklist can constitute a criminal act of "impairment of an electronic communication," according to Peter Black (QUT internet law lecturer), the maximum penalty for which is ten years in prison.
teamed up with award-winning,[162] non-traditional and digital creative agency Fnuky Advertising to launch a campaign in Australia to raise awareness of the Australian Government's flawed plans to introduce web censorship.
[163] Fnuky Advertising's Creative Director, David Campbell selected toothpaste as the platform for the campaign after Stephen Conroy stated the purpose of web censorship in Australia was to "Fight Moral Decay".
[170] The leaders of three of Australia's largest ISPs (Telstra, iiNet, and Internode) have stated in an interview that the web filtering proposal simply cannot work for various technical, legal and ethical reasons.
[172] Dale Clapperton, then chairperson of EFA, argued that the Labor party cannot implement the clean feed proposal without either new legislation and the support of the Australian Senate, or the assistance of the Internet Industry Association.
[175] Internode engineer Mark Newton was the subject of a letter of complaint from Stephen Conroy's office for his participation in a Whirlpool forum showing the negative impact of the filter on Internet access speeds.
Colin Jacobs, vice-chairman of Electronic Frontiers Australia, said that the pitfalls of mandatory ISP filtering were illustrated by the problems in the UK caused by the blocking of a single Wikipedia page.
[182] Retired Justice Michael Kirby believes that it is a bad example for the government of a democratic country like Australia to take control of what people hear and what information they get, and made comparisons to the situation in Iran and Burma.
[183] In an open letter to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, Reporters Without Borders states that the web filter is not the solution to combating child sex abuse, and the plan entails risks to freedom of expression.
[185][186] A report by Tim Stevens and Peter Neumann for the London-based International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence (ICSR) analyses each of the available ISP-based filtering solutions and concludes that they are ineffective in the fight against terror.
