Story.

The Federal Government has detailed its plan to require internet service providers (ISPs) in Australia to block a list of banned material.

When Parliament resumes next year the Government plans to introduce amendments that will require ISPs to block banned material on overseas servers.

I know I don't like it, what's your thoughts?

faaaaaaaaaarrrrkkkkkk

Risky thing to introduce in election year.

thank you f***tard labour voters.

think its time to move countries

Labor will definitely get savaged at the polls, but they have a huge margin. We're probably stuck with this s*** :(

last edited by Hogfather at 15:45:42 15/Dec/09

what ever will we do without youporn??????

nah seriously, this is a joke.. they will start banning everything soon. just like how crazy school admins get when they get the 'power' to do so... they get a high from doin that stuff...

COME ON TONY ABBOTT MY MAN BLOCK THIS s***

Where can we get blacklist.txt?

So what is the liberal partys official stance on this?

So what is the liberal partys official stance on this?

All I could find was this little ditty from Nick Minchin. Basically he says that filtering the internet in any sort of reliable way is too difficult.

Refused classification material will include child sex abuse, sexual violence and detailed instruction on crime.

I don't know what you guys get up to in your spare time but i don't think banning the above will affect me.. that much...

grats to the f***heads that voted labour

yeah infi, gratz! douche!

All I could find was this little ditty from Nick Minchin. Basically he says that filtering the internet in any sort of reliable way is too difficult.

So this is just another one of those things where it doesn't matter what party is in power, we'd probably be screwed anyway? Like surely if the liberal party were against this policy they'd be screaming it from the rooftops wouldn't they?

Refused classification material will include child sex abuse, sexual violence and detailed instruction on crime.

This sounds more like classification rules for games, but it is foolish to believe that that is all they will go after on the internets.

The law applies to the requirement of ISP blocking the connection but it doesn't apply to people trying to get around the filter on purpose with encryption and proxies. So hopefully we can still do exactly as we please, as with any law, just with the added tax of having to pay for the government to organise this.
Business as usual. Do whatever the hell you like, just don't get in trouble for it.

load of BS, do we have something like the ACLU in Australia?
I wonder what they'd have to say about this when the govt tries to fine/imprison someone for refusing to implement such bulls***

Refused classification material will include child sex abuse, sexual violence and detailed instruction on crime.

I don't know what you guys get up to in your spare time but i don't think banning the above will affect me.. that much...

Ok, so why don't you describe to us what 'sexual violence' actually means, and what kind of material will be banned under the proposed legislation. It's not black-and-white. It's very mildly grey and highly confusing.

Therein layeth thy problem.

It doesn't concern me that the government wants to try to filter (ok, I am technical enough to understand that it's impossible, but let's ignore that for a minute) - what concerns me is that what is filtered will not be transparent - imagine having a Michael Atkinson type of scenario in charge of the filtering...I want to see a proper mechanism for filtering before I support it. The ACMA blacklist is 1000 sites or so long now - what about when it's 15,000 sites long or 100,000 sites long? What are the mechanisms for managing it?

I sure as s*** don't want to see any mechanism that resembles the OFLC/Classification Board and Censorship Minister (Attorneys-General) approach.

what a complete and utter waste of taxpeyer money
sigh

Australian internet will soon only have sites rated MA 15 and lower.

QGL will be required to soon have a fluffy bear as a logo because the current one looks similar to a ninja star and can be used as a weapon.

QGL will be required to soon have a fluffy bear as a logo because the current one looks similar to a ninja star and can be used as a weapon.

Made me lol

If we get rid of the Video Ezy logo I hope we'll still be able to say f***.

/f***.

what ever will we do without youporn??????

nah.. seriously

Quick! Everyone rush off to join a Facebook group in protest. Kevin is so Web 2.0 savvy maybe he will notice.

nG!

"It is important that all Australians, particularly young children, are protected from this material,

Which of course is the governments job and not parents. Parents these days have no role in how their kids turn out and what they do anymore it seems as everything can be blamed on something else.

Wouldn't surprise me if soon we adopt the new Canadian law which has illegalized the talking to children on the internet. At all. If you meet a little kid in say WoW and talk to them, you can be arrested.

last edited by DM at 17:05:53 15/Dec/09

I don't really care so much about the content they're filtering, because the odds are pretty good its stuff I wouldn't want to look at anyway. What I'm more concerned about is the precedent its setting, and the fact that in trials, didn't the filtering technology result in something like a 20% drop in speeds? That bit does concern me.

Since Emma Watson turned 18 Khel isn't worried.

Labor will definitely get savaged at the polls, but they have a huge margin. We're probably stuck with this s*** :(

A cursory google has indicated that net censorship has been on the cards since 1997. The Liberal party will certainly vote in favour of it and anyone on here who doubts that is taking their Labor bashing to the extreme.

Also net censorship laws are widely popular so it will have no, read this absolutely NO impact on either party in the next election.

wow

makes the nazi loving liberal socialist s*** they got here in the netherlands look quite appealing

might stay on a bit longer

also i know you "can just use a proxy" but you the f*** will really do this... unless you have a private proxy os or pay for one

I don't know what you guys get up to in your spare time but i don't think banning the above will affect me.. that much...

I don't trust these c*** politicians with my tax...let alone what they'll do controlling information...Just wait and see what they'll do if they want to strike a deal with a family first member or independent who wants more blocked.

last edited by Twisted at 17:32:42 15/Dec/09

also i know you "can just use a proxy" but you the f*** will really do this... unless you have a private proxy os or pay for one

That is status quo though. At the moment using proxies to browse the web is virtually unheard of, nobody needs to do it, save for people doing something dodgy or trying to access an american TV network site, but when you screw 20 million people you may find you can buy proxy subscriptions in a gift voucher next to the itunes ones at woolies*.


*may be an exaggeration

The law applies to the requirement of ISP blocking the connection but it doesn't apply to people trying to get around the filter on purpose with encryption and proxies. So hopefully we can still do exactly as we please, as with any law, just with the added tax of having to pay for the government to organise this.
Business as usual. Do whatever the hell you like, just don't get in trouble for it.

ya. this is similar to parallel imports. those in the know use encrypted proxies/buy books from overseas and the proles get screwed for a useless gesture.

I don't know if I can go back to Playboy

I don't really care so much about the content they're filtering, because the odds are pretty good its stuff I wouldn't want to look at anyway.

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.

nobody came for the blacks?

i am friends with krudd on teh facebook, ill have a word to him and let him know this is a bad idea.

stay cool gang.

also, new business op, cheap and fast vpns, come and see me soon, prices available on request.

That's pretty close to a Hitler reference trog.

also, new business op, cheap and fast vpns, come and see me soon, prices available on request.

f***in a; this is going to be a better business driver than the entire NBN!

hoggy, what?

FUUUUUUUUUUU....

nobody came for the blacks?

they came for the blacks last

I doubt anyone would care or give 2 s***s about this if it was a optional thing and to get out of it you just had to call your ISP. Instead they use a broadsword for a situation that requires a scalpel.

In the trial they blocked a whole bunch of stuff that wasn't illegal. Saying "they're only going to block illegal stuff" is stupid, because they've already demonstrated they won't.

This could be the starw thatb reaks the camels back, this next move to install this net censorship plan will cost a lot of money and may put the country into debt and destroy the economy.

Whats kevin rudds economic policy been since he got in.

Sign spend, spend, spend, spend, sign, spend, spend, spend.

No one cares besides us, you guys give the public too much credit.

Wouldn't surprise me if soon we adopt the new Canadian law which has illegalized the talking to children on the internet. At all. If you meet a little kid in say WoW and talk to them, you can be arrested.

How the hell do you even know if the person you're talking to is a kid? I know when I was >16 I used to tell eveyone in quake I was 60+ when they asked.

I doubt anyone would care or give 2 s***s about this if it was a optional thing

Agreed. I live by myself, why the hell should I be filtered?

I don't know what you guys get up to in your spare time but i don't think banning the above will affect me.. that much...

Did you even see the things that did get blacklisted in the trials?

This government set up a wall. They've left a lot of open doors. But the next one can quietly start closing more and more and more doors because they don't have to really pass anything to do it.

Most people won't even notice the sites that disappear. Stuff like 4chan won't be reachable, and some of the people you hate will cry out. Then some of the sites you used to go to because you were being slightly dodgy. Then some of the legitimate sites which hold opinions not in alignment with the current views of whatever political party.

The problem isn't what its aimed to filter, but what it potentially can filter.

edit: for example you may notice your overseas game purchase places disappear like http://www.365games.co.uk/ might disappear because they sell games which are refused classification in australia.

Edit again:

I used to tell eveyone in quake I was 60+ when they asked.

we knew you were lying :P

last edited by skythra at 18:54:28 15/Dec/09

Welcome to Kevingrad.

This country is becoming a joke. How about sorting some actual problems out before creating new ones through bulls*** nanny state s***. People in this country don't realise how unfree it is becoming.

I assume circumventing the filter would be illegal?

That f***ing sucks sorry to hear that guys

Haha better than your internet still f***er

So, when do they expect this to run?

First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.

It's so relevent it's scary.

Legislation will be put to parliament in the new year and you can expect it to commcne shortly after.

Still prefer the nofx version of Re-Gaining Unconsciousness

But I can still get my child porn and violent sex movies from Usenet right?

+1 for thanks you f***in retard labour voters.

I hope you enjoy the massive public debt and no internets, I don't.

Legislation will be put to parliament in the new year and you can expect it to commcne shortly after.

Is part of being a Liberal mouthpiece deliberately providing misleading information?

link to discussion paper where they are asking for community feedback

The Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, said today he would introduce legislation just before next year's elections to force ISPs to block a blacklist of "refused classification" (RC) websites for all Australian internet users.

Quote from SMH regarding when the legislation will be introduced

I don't particularly have any strong views regarding internet censorship but i still think that there needs to be a line drawn somewhere. Exactly where is the big question, and that i don't have the answer to. Having said that, if you're to ask my opinion about particular content such as child pornography then i say f*** that s*** "as in filter that s*** right out". I don't care who you are or what kind of crazy child fetish you have, that's just not on and it needs to be filtered out. Bestiality too, but then again i hear some of you like a bit of camel schlong up your poo pipe so whatever..

To state the obvious, at the end of the day someone is always going to have a whinge because you can't please everyone, so someone like me is just going to roll with it for the time being until s*** really get out of hand, like god forbid filtering out google because G is the first letter of Gagga and she happens to be a slag with a pecker tucked underneath.

last edited by MatchFixa at 20:54:48 15/Dec/09

+1 for thanks you f***in retard labour voters.

Why don't all you Liberal party followers get your party to block this in the senate, they do have the numbers, oh wait you're all missing this point, this policy has unanimous support. Seriously some of you shouldn't even have the vote.

They both suck, you get to vote for s***ty party A or s***ty party B.

The Liberals are mildly retarded, where as Labour have the full downs.

I don't work in IT, but if this filter is effective, why can't it be offered for free and implemented on a PC to PC basis? Or is any user-end filtering doomed to getting cracked instantly like the governments last effort?

imitation: i was quoting from the original article, you ALP stooge.

When Parliament resumes next year the Government plans to introduce amendments that will require ISPs to block banned material on overseas servers.

im pretty sure liberal bigwigs everywhere are cursing the alp for coming up with this retarted plan first

Dont try and be high and mighty infi, the liberals dont have the balls to even try to block this, i'd love to be proven wrong though.

Labor are d*******s for bringing it it, if the liberals try to block it they have my vote, but I just cant see it happening.

I love the way they put it out that they are blocking child porn, sexual violence etc, yes it will block some obvious sites, but anyone that actualy wants to see this stuff will find a way.

The filter is completely pointless, like having deadbolts on the front door of a tent to stop people breaking in.

it's not unfeasible to have your modem configured to l2tp every bit of your traffic to a port somewhere in a private rack somewhere in europe/the americas

everyone has at least 5mbit these days, I remember when 5mbit would have been $5k/month delivered to your home and it wasn't that long ago
if you really wanted encrypted internets, it's very doable with ipsec/tor/etc

it's not unfeasible to have your modem configured to l2tp every bit of your traffic to a port somewhere in a private rack somewhere in europe/the americas

Thats the problem, if you said that to a politician they would have no f***en idea what you just said and how easy it is to do.

it's very doable with ipsec/tor/etc

I've tried Tor just to see how it works, what the go is. I wouldn't go so far to say it's "doable" in it's current state. However, if it suddenly had a lot more users, it would be much more usable. In it's current form it's simply too slow.

It is funny going to google.com when you are using Tor though - you end up being localised by the country of the computer you were routed through last :-)

I like your thinking but not everyone's going to be capable to configure layer 2 tunneling nor have the gear to support it. And also I imagine that they will be cracking down on cryptographic tools, anything with vpn capability, or proxy related.

I would like to see what the uptake of vpn services is going to be like once the filter is implemented

If this is another law that's going to be generally circumvented or broadly ignored it is another step in the path to general civil disobedience. I think that's the scary thing about creating more and more laws that are generally not accepted once people break one law their belief in the rule of law is degraded and I think that has wider social implications.

Pinky, I'm talking a shell server that you're paying $100/month for somewhere they just give you an ethernet feed into your ipsec router and you've got 5mbit between yourself and your euro/us connection, what you do with it from there - whether it be more vpns or just use their internet, is up to you

tor is just one example of something you could do

They'll just block VPN providers too

They'll just block VPN providers too

Surely not, the purpose of the ban is to block RC material.

I'd move countries if they told me that I couldn't communicate freely around the globe unless they had some way of listening to my conversations without my say so
wouldn't you?

Why don't all you Liberal party followers get your party to block this in the senate, they do have the numbers, oh wait you're all missing this point, this policy has unanimous support. Seriously some of you shouldn't even have the vote

The liberal party didn't take a policy of manditory isp level filtering to the last election. They had the net nanny software for free.

unanimous support really....

From Nick Minchins post last month who coincidently is Conroy's shadow minister

“The Opposition firmly believes that adult supervision, supported by optional user-end filters, effective law enforcement and education should be front and centre of any efforts to keep children safe online,” he said.

Reads strangely different from the opposition will give massive centralized filtering its unconditional support.

The moment that they start blocking vpn access though it will have a huge flow on effect on legitimate business. Whats to say they won't attempt to block other types of encrypted traffic for that matter.

last edited by HerbalLizard at 21:33:15 15/Dec/09

Dont try and be high and mighty infi, the liberals dont have the balls to even try to block this, i'd love to be proven wrong though.

they surprised everyone by blocking the ETS. they could end up blocking this as well because it is 'ineffective and a waste of money'.

I've tried Tor just to see how it works, what the go is. I wouldn't go so far to say it's "doable" in it's current state. However, if it suddenly had a lot more users, it would be much more usable. In it's current form it's simply too slow.

more users could make it worse unless people act as gateways to the internet.

i think some of the darknet projects are much cooler. freenet is probably cursed to be perpetually slow/have a poor experience because it is document oriented. probably perfect for distributing porn. i think I2P is much cooler because you can run normal websites on it and run lots of different protocols on top of it. i think when we start to get bigger pipes there is a risk of the populace just saying, 'f*** it', and doing like 90% of their internet usage on darknets.

They'll just block VPN providers too

will the block amazon EC2 as well? EC2 is a pretty cheap way of avoiding censorship for small amounts of surfing. i just putty in and set up a dynamic tunnel and point my browser to the tunnel and surf through the EC2 box in the US with no filtering. you could automate this into a one click solution if you wanted to :)

last edited by hast at 21:38:32 15/Dec/09

It's just a load of s***.

Nuff said!!

There are some interesting replies on that site.

Guy Boyd:
15 Dec 2009 4:24:49pm

This is an atrocious waste of money and resources.

* It will not work! Only web content will be filtered!
* Limewire/Bittorrent/FTP/email/IRC and a huge number of other mediums will not be filtered and still allow illegal and child pornographic content through.
* VPN/SSL/TOR protocols and mediums cannot be filtered or monitored.
* Filtering monitored networks drives real criminals to follow guides to access unmonitored networks, complicating investigations into child abuse.
* It will have a massively adverse effect on the performance of the internet in Australia.
* The more accurate the filter, the slower it is. The most accurate had speed drops of 80%
* The fastest filter (also the least accurate) still slowed down net speed by 20%, even when not filtering. It also recorded many false positives.
* It will be expensive. Implementation alone will cost hundreds of millions of dollars. What a huge waste of hard earned tax payers money.
* Not to mention flow on costs to our economy from diminished internet capacity in a country that is already lagging behind in broadband technology.
* They are lying about the success of the filters! It wont work!

Even if they can create the perfect filter, one that is cheap, reliable and covers all mediums. Proxies and encryption will mean there will always be a way to get around this waste of money. Implementing it will never work, the technology just is not there.

Everyone will be subjected to this content filtering!

It will slow down the internet!

It will cost a fortune!

It will not work, what a waste!


--

On another note, No other western democracy has ISP level filtering.

This just sounds f***ed up.

Isn't all the child porn material shared in a way that bypasses the filter anyway?

they surprised everyone by blocking the ETS.

Realy?, wasnt very suprising to me, the nationals said they would never vote for an ETS, and alot of liberals never supported the idea.

On another note, No other western democracy has ISP level filtering.

UK does.

UK does.

citation required

Isn't all the child porn material shared in a way that bypasses the filter anyway?

I'm not an expert on child porn but in a study I read a significant number searches on the torrent network were collected and a large proportion specifically requested underage pornographic material. I believe something like 75% of the requests were for females and the average age requested (where a figure was included in the search terms) was 14 years old. I posted the title of the article somewhere on this forum before. I only read the abstract though.

UK does.

This is correct. I don't have a citation but I believe they do domain-level filtering.

Isn't all the child porn material shared in a way that bypasses the filter anyway?

there is a document on wikileaks from an 'insider' which is very disturbing (mainly because the author tries to rationalize the abuse) that describes how cp distributors avoid filtering. seeing as people get busted for cp there must be a decent amount which would be caught by a filter.

Mandatory*

This is correct. I don't have a citation but I believe they do domain-level filtering.

they do URL level filtering. if you go to an ip associated with bad urls then you are routed through a proxy which will filter all the bad urls. there was a big controversy when a wikipedia article was censored which meant no-one in the UK could edit wikipedia pages because all internet users were coming from a small pool of ip addresses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_the_United_Kingdom

last edited by hast at 21:55:41 15/Dec/09

I've been on the internet for 12 f***ing years and NEVER came across any of that s***(and lol no I've never looked for that stuff on purpose either). You can accidentally come across normal porno and other untasteful stuff, but not that heinous s*** mentioned.

The internet is not a f***ing childcare device. Use the filter provided previously, and if your kid is old and/or smart enough to circumvent it then do some f***ing parenting.

---

"It also demonstrated that it can be done with negligible impact on internet speed."

How about the stupid bastard actually tells us what the real % speed impact is instead of this vague horses*** spin. This is what really has me pissed, our already s*** internets becoming slower.

For the guys alluding to stuff like them blocking legitimate sites on their whim like your games store sites because they have RC games for sale, I can't believe none of you quoted this:-

"Grants will also be offered to ISPs to voluntarily block other content."

^^^^^^^^^^
WHAT THE f***?

To me that just proves they want to block whatever the f*** they want.

KRUDD:- I dislike this site saying ima f***** leader of a f***** party that highlights all my mistakes & stupidity, give the ISP's a few G's to block it.

I hate both major parties, but the ALP are total wankers and scum. At least the libs was voluntary even if it was crap.

You would hope that AFP or whoever searches for child porn offenders are at least as switched-on as the people on this forum. They are computer professionals, they aren't mum and dads trying to work out how to turn off caps-lock.

I have had one very disturbing unsolicited message in MSN Messenger before which I forwarded to the AFP. It wasn't your usual Russian bride type stuff, it was very specific and freaked me out. Since you need an email address to send messages on Messenger I figured that at least they could get a lead from it, so I figured it was worth sending to them.

elaborate!

Nah, it was f***ed up. But it gave specific ages and genders of two children and described acts. It was completely different from the usual spam you see and it was two separate messages from memory. Was a couple of years ago. But yeah, my first thought was "What the f*** is this?" and my second thought was, "How do I forward to some computer crimes dept?" - it was pretty easy, the AFP have an online submission form for such things. I never heard back and I was never contacted by anyone about it. It probably went into a black-hole. I hope it's registered somewhere though.

If there's one thing I can't stand in this life it's f***ing pedophiles. Ruining kids lives left, right and center. Bastards should be bloody shot.

It's not like the Pedophiles will just up and vanish because the internet gets filtered ..

You would hope that AFP or whoever searches for child porn offenders are at least as switched-on as the people on this forum. They are computer professionals, they aren't mum and dads trying to work out how to turn off caps-lock.

Utopia right?
Cept people (read: Experienced Police and I.T Profiessionals) with that *unique* combination of skillsets wouldn't be required.

99% of the time, they are just standard cops who have a really f***ing difficult job and no idea of the tech involved.
Seriously? How many people do you know that have such dissimilar professions?

Utopia right?
Cept people (read: Experienced Police and I.T Profiessionals) with that *unique* combination of skillsets wouldn't be required.

99% of the time, they are just standard cops who have a really f***ing difficult job and no idea of the tech involved.
Seriously? How many people do you know that have such dissimilar professions?

Pretty much spot on.

From various officers I know, in these sort of units, there might be 1 highly skilled, very techincal specialist working with a larger amount (10/20/30 etc.) standard federal police with nothing but a white collar/justice/military background.

Same goes with the majority of specialist state police units.

In an ideal world, every officer working inside child porn would have awesome IT skills... but it just isn't the case, the majority of them probably can't use a computer properly.

It amazes me why and how you know the inner workings of the police system CHUB.

I'm loling at the retards who are saying "welp time to move countries!". This isn't going to go, not in it's current form.

It's not like the Pedophiles will just up and vanish because the internet gets filtered ..

I was actually wondering if the incidence of real life situations would increase since the pedos couldn't get their fix online anymore would they go out & kidnap/stalk real children instead?

I wonder if they'd be able to somehow filter out games as well eventually if they don't want us playing war type games.

I'm loling at the retards who are saying "welp time to move countries!". This isn't going to go, not in it's current form.

It's like those people who would rather pack up their s*** & move house just because they can't get a certain type of broadband only worse. Why would you pack up your entire life and move to another country? Does your life really revolve that much around the internet?

The sad truth is I think there's more people for this who vote than against it because hey what lazyass parent wouldn't love to just sit their kid in front of a PC all day while they talk on the phone about the latest gossip on the new guy at work or be at the pub?



last edited by whoop at 01:20:16 16/Dec/09

It amazes me why and how you know the inner workings of the police system CHUB.

I've dealt with a lot of cops and I know a lot of cops (friends and family), plus I take a strong personal interest.

Just talking s*** here since I cbf finding out what filtering method they are using, but if they were to do it so it wouldn't slow down the net, and at an ISP level, wouldn't a ""sensible"" way be just filter at the ISP's DNS level? If so, 8.8.8.8 (google dns) workaround?

What if it's insurance?

Could they conceivably extend the filtering to tap into the web browsing habits of nasties visiting known networks / sites ?

Could it be a useful tool in tandem with legal intercept?

Personally, I suspect to a fed my web searches aren't really that interesting, so I don't have too much of a problem.
Oh yes, at first they came for the jews..

We all know it's ineffective and a vote turnoff, yet politically it refuses to die. It can't just be Steve Fielding & FF. What's it going to cost ? $100 million or something. How much is this NBN again?

i hope kev does read his facebook page, because hes taking a hammering on it

dranged you're paraniod. the chances of that happening are next to nothing, in australia. in america... haha well you're probably being monitored now.

Both the greens and activist group, getup, have panned the filter too.

KRUDD:- I dislike this site saying ima f***** leader of a f***** party that highlights all my mistakes & stupidity, give the ISP's a few G's to block it.

http://qgl.ausforums.com just made the list

paranoid or not, I don't want to end up living in a world where everything I say/do can be traced back to some log file
Even if they are only using it to catch bad guys, who's to say that they wouldn't use it in some other court case without my concent down the line?

nothing to worry about if I've done nothing wrong you say? plenty of innocent people go to gaol.

/faceman

faceman has been strangely quiet the last few weeks.

Could they conceivably extend the filtering to tap into the web browsing habits of nasties visiting known networks / sites ?

Could it be a useful tool in tandem with legal intercept?

I'd be super surprised if they couldn't do that right now anyway, but they'd need a warrant or whatever court approval to do it

I'd be super surprised if they couldn't do that right now anyway, but they'd need a warrant or whatever court approval to do it

Of course, but Crowd-surfing and information theory around social and web networks are hot topics right now. Just look at the Red Balloon Challenge the pentagon recently announced. How in the hell did they do that!

Labour

It's Labor.

What happens in other countries when f***head feminists etc come up with stupid things like this? Why can't our pollies just tell them to suck on their plums instead of bending over backwards to try and please everyone?

Hey if it pisses off a small minority, who cares?

I'd tell them to suck my plums

oh yeah

there was a small article about it in the courier mail (yer i know) today with conroy stating that the trial shows that it wont slow the internet and that the filter is 100% effective.

what a lying bastard.

I may actually vote for the 1st time in my life.

he's game saying "100%"

If you don't think something like this imposes on your civil liberties enough that you might consider moving to a new country, you're a sheep

RC-rated material includes .... and the detailed instruction of crime or drug use.

The truth is that this censorship is designed not to stop child abuse as they like to cleverly allude to but to simply wall it off from the general public so it is out of sight out of mind. If they wanted to actually catch peodos then instead of filtering sites they should be setting up logs on those sites to catch those that frequent them. If they spent this money to stop child abuse I'd be f***ing ecstatic but they're not, they are spending all of this money to control the information available to the Australian public and to think that they would somehow stop at what they have already stated they will censor is foolish.

Watching a video about cutting heroine or robbing a bank doesn't mean I'm going to rob a bank while off my tit.

he's game saying "100%"

I have yet in my life to see anything along the same lines being 100%.

I pay good money to use the internet each month, if I wanted filtered content I'd pay for a filter and implement it myself.

You could scream things like, "THIS IS TO PROTECT THE KIDDIES!" Well, sir, I do have kids and to protect them from the bad things that could happen I teach them the difference between right and wrong.

I want to know what happen to our freedom of choice? What happened to learning from our mistakes? What happened to common since? I want to know why the government has to a play the part of Jimny Cricket? I’m a real BOY not some puppet on a string.

paranoid or not, I don't want to end up living in a world where everything I say/do can be traced back to some log file
...
nothing to worry about if I've done nothing wrong you say? plenty of innocent people go to gaol.

I disagree with this. This here internet is very much a public place.

Anything you do or say in public is admissible as evidence - why should the internet be different? A lack of accountability for your actions in a public place surely can't be a good thing?

PS- I hate the f***ing filter too. Just to be sure about that.

Krudd has been spending too much time in china..

interesting Poll Result over at the SMH.

redtube :(

Anything you do or say in public is admissible as evidence - why should the internet be different? A lack of accountability for your actions in a public place surely can't be a good thing?

there's a difference between a conversation I'm having with my mate in europe, via the internet
and a conversation I'm having with a mate in europe, via the internet while someone else has the ability to listen in
they're basically trying to mandate a system where they can snoop on everything you say/do

it's like telling me I can't go to a park with my mate and have a private conversation with him/her because "they cant hear what we're saying so we shouldn't be doing it" ?

if I want to communicate in private with someone, that's my choice
what gives them the right to snoop on anything I say without my permission

interesting Poll Result over at the SMH.

if ever there was a case of selection bias

last edited by hast at 14:33:51 16/Dec/09

looks like the liberals support protecting the children but not through a mandatory internet filter:

The Coalition fully supports measures to protect children from inappropriate internet content, and is of the firm belief that appropriate adult supervision and guidance should be front and centre of all online safety efforts.

http://www.liberal.org.au/news.php?Id=4361

Wow at that poll, must have got smashed by some geek forum somewhere, I just don't believe most Australians care.

there's a difference between a conversation I'm having with my mate in europe, via the internet
and a conversation I'm having with a mate in europe, via the internet while someone else has the ability to listen in
they're basically trying to mandate a system where they can snoop on everything you say/do

Only caught half the thread, I'm apparently working!

Email & IM (like all private communication) should be governed by privacy laws, court order required to listen in. I was more talking about public spaces onthe internet like forums etc.

what gives them the right to snoop on anything I say without my permission

Well, they are our elected officials and if they suspect you of committing a crime or being about to commit a crime, then it sort of makes sense. But there needs to be really strong, strictly enforced rules about WHEN they are able to do this.

AFAIK they require a warrant which requires a bit of effort to get a judge to approve. We need strong laws about personal privacy so judges can refer to those in these sorts of situations. It needs to be REALLY hard for police to get these warrants and they need to have REALLY strong, compelling evidence that a crime has been / is about to be committed before they should be granted (which, again afaik, is what happens now).

It should be noted that this stupid filter isn't (yet) a privacy issue, though we need to wait and see what the draft legislation says.

If you care about privacy (you should) and care about making things happen to ensure your civil liberties are not encroached further by this government or future governments, please consider becoming an EFA member.

It is $55 / year (less than $5 / month) or a once-off $275 for lifetime membership. Join now!!@#

Whilst the Coalition remains concerned that the Rudd Government’s approach will simply be unmanageable, we have also said from the beginning that we were prepared to assess any credible trial results.

Now that Senator Conroy has finally produced the report, that detail needs to be assessed.

From same Liberal press release, this policy appeals to the Liberal core conservatives, to think that it will be voted against by them is just plainly ignoring what the party stands for not to mention its populist approach.

I don't believe SMH polls. On that page:

Liberal leadership : Who should lead?

Malcolm Turnbull - 66%
Joe Hockey - 21%
Tony Abbott - 13%

telstra, optus and primus are backing the filter :/

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2009/12/telstra-optus-and-primus-all-announce-support-for-conroys-filter/

^^^ this. (trog)

It isn't about monitoring MSN conversations, Surely they can do that anyway if they suspect someone (ie. mirror a bitstream). I reckon it'd be useful in tandem with the nasties database to be able to cross-reference favorite URLs, ie, freedom isn't free, it costs folk just like you and me

It is $55 / year (less than $5 / month) or a once-off $275 for lifetime membership. Join now!!@#

er do you have approval from trog to be pimping this?

SEO in Australia will now be done by getting your competition on the ACMA censored list, that'll get rid of the competition pretty quickly.

^^ Dude, as an option, I would happily vote for Malcolm. Merchant banker or not, tbh he seems pretty sensible imo

Yeah I just don't think I could ever trust them to do that, though
given that by the time your trust is broken, it's far far too late to do anything about it

I'd prefer to live in a world where s*** might go wrong sometimes, than have someone telling me they're making sure nothing can go wrong ever again
Are we going to end up at a point where everything that can go wrong in the world has been analysed and some process put in place so that it doesn't happen?

at what point do we say "ok the worlds pretty good, lets stop trying to make decisions for everyone and just kind of let things happen of their own accord"

edit:

this is what scares me

what are you going to do when some minister decides to block a legit website because he thinks that the website shouldn't be viewed by anyone just because it contains content he doesn't like personally
I mean seriously, what is the course of action to regain access to legitimate information?
once your freedom to choose is taken away, it's much harder to get it back.

last edited by tequila at 14:53:39 16/Dec/09

teq I reckon it's unrealistic to just let 's*** happen' when it comes to the net. it is a free-for-all, and at the extremes that is f***ing dangerous.

Also imo telstra/optus/primus are bowing to political circumstances (wahoo!!! let's build a $42 billion information superhighway)

last edited by dranged at 14:52:47 16/Dec/09

I reckon it's unrealistic to just let 's*** happen' when it comes to the net. it is a free-for-all, and at the extremes that is f***ing dangerous.

What does that even mean? What is the fantastic danger currently faced to our way of living by the an open uncensored net? That's just an alarmist comment.

Any technological change has the potential for good and bad use, however squashing its overall potential in the hope of lessoning it's negative impact doesn't make sense.

ok, lets all make a compromise, we've got some big name telcos that are happy to have censored internet, lets let them have it!

leave our iinets,inodes and tpgs free for us to make the decision whats acceptable and whats not.

I say make it optional, rather than mandatory

the most audacious part of the concept is that a treacle-like bureaucracy can hope to keep pace with the speed of domain name changes as they exist on the internet.

what happens when the website gets blocked and then changes it's domain name and identifiers?

what happens when someone in good faith buys a generic domain name off the offensive website, not knowing its history?

and if your website somehow manages to find itself on the s*** list good luck to getting it off.

It would be an interesting scenario should the filter f*** up and blocked something like trading on comsec, imagine the outcry, they would be chasing them for millions of lost revenue. Once implemented it would take an epic f***-up of gargantuan proportions to get rid of it.

Any technological change has the potential for good and bad use, however squashing its overall potential in the hope of lessoning it's negative impact doesn't make sense.

How can monitoring usage 'squash' potential growth of the internets? You would reckon that the spooks are really only interested in Bad s*** Happening™. And even then they are going to be very low-key about it. So, you would probably never even know.

It's preposterous,. the whole 'let's do the NBN' thing is based on, 'Hey, we have no idea what we could be doing in X years', YET, it's unsurmountable for Govt. to use the same argument when defending a mechanism which currently, if you look at net access in comparison to any other public broadcast / access mediums, has absolutely ZERO regulations applied against it.

What seriously, does it cost? Does anyone seriously look at, whatever the hell is on those lists? If you do, why can't you use TOR/Proxy/External DNS, s***, even fly overseas to get it! The point is, it's background radiation which any real Australian shouldn't have to give a s*** about. This isn't f***ing Zimbabwe, get a grip guys!

Information Technology (and Internet technologies) develop at an incredible pace, IMO it makes sense to have some kind of (preferably low-level) measure, JUST IN CASE, against it.

I love how they snuck this in (almost below the radar)during after the R18+ debate, almost like they wanted to gloss this over and sneak it past us....

paranoid or not, I don't want to end up living in a world where everything I say/do can be traced back to some log file
Even if they are only using it to catch bad guys, who's to say that they wouldn't use it in some other court case without my concent down the line?

nothing to worry about if I've done nothing wrong you say? plenty of innocent people go to gaol.

/faceman

This whole paranoia angel some people are trying to pull is retarded. If you're going to oppose such a system that has several huge flaws in it then target those, not "WHAT IF I GO TO JAIL IM INNOCENT!" bulls***.

a low level measure that has absolutely no chance of keeping pace with the changes in websites for subversive materials - just a whole bunch of outdated blocks. what a laugh.

infi, not really, everyone uses http mate. How old is it? Wikipedia / Berners Lee reckons it is 96. f***... Wasn't it earlier than that?

when the blocked site is www.xyzillegal.com and they just change their domain name to www.abcillegal.com wow we are open for business in Austalia again, awesome!

when the blocked site is www.xyzillegal.com and they just change their domain name to www.abcillegal.com wow we are open for business in Austalia again, awesome!

and then abcillegal.com gets blocked and they change it to dceillegal.com, etc. etc. etc.

Yeah, this filter thing will be real smrt.

Wikipedia / Berners Lee reckons it is 96

Standardised in '96, invented in about 1990 I think.

^ ta. Point is, Even the crazies don't want to constantly re-remember their favorite anti-infidel fundamentalist site every three weeks. Or maybe they do. Anyway, it's good that we can keep track of that.

infi, you can still track domain name changes, especially by this mechanism proposed. Sure, you can change all the details about WHO owns a domain, etc, but, it's still the same people who visit it - That's who you track.

so now are we wanting to block access or track who is accessing? what is the exact purpose of this, is it censorship or law enforcement, or is it law enforcement disguised as censorship?

subversive elements do not rely on simple domain names, they us IRC and other sophisticated technologies. i watch NCIS, I know these things.

Yes they do, I heard that Al-Qaeda are moving to Google Wave!@#%

i watch NCIS, I know these things.

They speak 1337 too. I've heard it's harder to decode than RSA.

IRC is also heaps sophisticated, before anyone says otherwise, ..|,

so now are we wanting to block access or track who is accessing? what is the exact purpose of this, is it censorship or law enforcement, or is it law enforcement disguised as censorship?

subversive elements do not rely on simple domain names, they us IRC and other sophisticated technologies. i watch NCIS, I know these things.

infi, you're flailing around spastically, calm down dude or you'll get froth all over your keyboard

I was responding to this statement:

Sure, you can change all the details about WHO owns a domain, etc, but, it's still the same people who visit it - That's who you track.

and I'm not flailing over anything, I am trying to clarify what people would intend we use the "filter" for.

hahahaha @ trog. that's better than infi's line in the sunday mail thread.

I reckon we should track drug users and definitely not drug suppliers, that would defo work to solve drug problems.

so now are we wanting to block access or track who is accessing? what is the exact purpose of this, is it censorship or law enforcement, or is it law enforcement disguised as censorship?

subversive elements do not rely on simple domain names, they us IRC and other sophisticated technologies. i watch NCIS, I know these things.

infi, you're flailing around spastically, calm down dude or you'll get froth all over your keyboard

Haha I lol'd

teq I reckon it's unrealistic to just let 's*** happen' when it comes to the net. it is a free-for-all, and at the extremes that is f***ing dangerous.

Yeah thank god we survived these 20 odd years of unfiltered internets. I don't know how I will get through then next few months thinking about all the dangers of my unfiltered internets. Oh the possibilities!

QGL will probably be on ACMA's black list being that this site contains detailed instructions on how to circumvent the filter.

then so would the search term google.com/search?q=vpn

that's ok imitation. we'll just switch to the ausgamers domain then.

Didn't that whole patriot act thing kind of negate the need for a warrant if a bunch of feds think you're up to something they just scream patriot act & snoop through your stuff? Seeing as aus is in a free trade thing with the us it wouldn't surprise me if that also allows them to monitor everything we're doing as well & act upon it.

Basically, y'all are screwed.

what gives them the right to snoop on anything I say without my permission

Well, they are our elected officials and if they suspect you of committing a crime or being about to commit a crime, then it sort of makes sense.

all I'm saying is, at what point do we stop allowing our freedom of choice to be taken away from us
they're going to make this mandatory, that means even if you don't have an under 18 year old person in your home, your internet is going to be censored whether you like it or not

some might say that's fine, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree (because I don't have anything to hide)
but would we do we do if they said "you can no longer run ipsec tunnels, anyone caught doing so will be fined and have their equipment seized"
some might even say that's fine because hey, I've got nothing to hide .. but when does it stop?

/paranoid rant

Does this mean I could start selling connections on my openvpn server here in a US datacentre for like $10 a year or something ?

link

Google Australia blogs about their objections to government internet filtering proposal.

The recent report by Professors Catharine Lumby, Lelia Green, and John Hartley, Untangling The Net: The Scope of Content Caught By Mandatory Internet Filtering, has found that a wide scope of content could be prohibited under the proposed filtering regime. Refused Classification (or RC) is a broad category of content that includes not just child sexual abuse material but also socially and politically controversial material -- for example, educational content on safer drug use -- as well as the grey realms of material instructing in any crime, including politically controversial crimes such as euthanasia. This type of content may be unpleasant and unpalatable but we believe that government should not have the right to block information which can inform debate of controversial issues.

While the discussion on ISP filtering continues, we should all retain focus on making the Internet safer for people of all ages. Our view is that online safety should focus on user education, user empowerment through technology tools (such as SafeSearch Lock), and cooperation between law enforcement and industry partners.

and then abcillegal.com gets blocked and they change it to dceillegal.com, etc. etc. etc.

why do you think abcillegal will care enough to change their website solely for the few hundred australian audience. They would risk losing an entire world audience by changing their name.

and then abcillegal.com gets blocked and they change it to dceillegal.com, etc. etc. etc.

why do you think abcillegal will care enough to change their website solely for the few hundred australian audience. They would risk losing an entire world audience by changing their name.

If there's money to be made or demand from an Australian market they'd just keep abcillegal and mirror it somewhere else, you're missing the point I think.

last edited by imitation at 10:54:56 17/Dec/09

Dunno if someone else has posted this ....

Google have spoken out about the Australian Internet filter and they say NO ...woohoo Google

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/12/16/2773749.htm

Bit more of an insight into what is going on.
A few beautiful quotes in this article.

O'TOOLE: So do you have a rate of over-blocking in mind that would be unacceptable?

CONROY: Well as I've said, let's wait to see what the trial shows us.

O'TOOLE: And then you'll put the goal posts up afterwards?

CONROY: As I said, you want to pre-empt the trial, then we're happy to wait to see what the trial comes back to us with. Perfectly happy.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2773952.htm

Seriously, it pisses me off it is not opt-out. I hate to go all FaceMan, but I'm really thinking there is much, much more to this than kiddy fiddling and goat porn. A point brought up in one of the comments is that any opposition to this policy is stifled as Conroy (and the die-hard Christians) call the opponents child molesters. f*** this. Democracy my arse, I have no say in what my government is doing, f*** them.

Hyperslide, your article says at the bottom "The Government has requested comments from interested parties on its proposals for filtering and we encourage everyone to make their views known in this important debate."

So, for anyone that is interested, here is an online comment form in order to make your views known.

http://www.dbcde.gov.au/resources/contact_us/contact_department

Who knows who will read our comments or care, but it's better than nothing.

edit: lol
http://www.censordyne.com.au/

edit2: http://www.getup.org.au/campaign/SaveTheNet&id=892

last edited by Seven at 12:29:03 17/Dec/09

Crikey crunches the numbers on how net censorship will affect the ALP in the next election. Good news is not at all.

That paper linked in the google article is interesting im about halfway thru.

I can't believe soft crap like candle wax in SnM gets RC.

WTF?

This blacklist is going to be the biggest joke in IT since java applications.

Microsoft tackle child porn with automated software that helps detect it.

Man, MS will make so much money peddling that to governments. Awesome idea.

Good article on The Age website - this issue is gaining momentum: Teh_clicky

Java programmer reporting in!

As someone has already mentioned the majority of this "unacceptable material" is not just THERE on the internet for all to find...

Sure I've stumbled upon regular porn before searching for legit things.
However in the many years I've been online never have I accidentally just stumbled onto anything like child porn or rape material... never.

Is regular porn going to be blocked?
If not then the filter isn't going to accomplish anything towards "protecting the children".

It baffles me how some of these projects are headed by people/teams with no idea on the technology they are dealing with...

I think I'll just quit this thread before my brain explodes.

the only time ive ever stumbled upon child porn was when some was a****** posting it on 4chan.

From Pinky's link:

Conversely, the Australian Christian Lobby has said it wants the mandatory filters broadened to cover all X- and R-rated content on the internet.

Conroy's spokesman has repeatedly failed to return calls requesting comment.

What you people a forgetting is the Filter is directly linked to the Classification Board;

The Australian Government is committed to a comprehensive range of cyber-safety measures including law enforcement, filtering, research, technology and education.
The Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy has recently announced measures to require internet service provider (ISP) level filtering of overseas-hosted internet material classified Refused Classification (RC) under the National Classification Scheme. Such material includes child sexual abuse imagery, bestiality, sexual violence, detailed instruction in crime, violence or drug use and/or material that advocates the doing of a terrorist act.
The Minister for Home Affairs has released a discussion paper considering whether there should be an R18+ category for computer games in Australia. The discussion paper is available at www.ag.gov.au/gamesclassification. Submissions on this issue should be directed to the Attorney-General’s Department. The Government’s approach to filtering online games will be developed drawing on this consultation process.
Overseas hosted content that is classified RC will be included on a list maintained by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) for the purpose of ISP filtering. This list will be known as the ‘RC content list’.

If a site mentions games on the RC list it will be filtered. Steam will get banned and you won't be able to play those legal games you've legally payed for.

http://www.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/123833/TransparencyAccountabilityPaper.pdf

Testing of Conroy's internet filter flawed: expert
http://apcmag.com/testing-of-conroys-internet-filter-was-flawed-expert-.htm

Seems although the NBN is supposed to deliver 100 megabits per sec, the filter was tested at a max of 8 megabits per sec. So negligible speed loss is not even tested at that level.

Hah would be kind of awesome in a pathetic, skullcrushing kind of way if the NBN didn't work because of the filter.

It annoys me that they even mention that this will have any impact whatsoever on things like kiddy porn.

Its doesnt matter how effective the web filter is at all, the web filter could be 100% effective but the main aim of blocking kiddy porn will still have not been acheived, becuase of the numerous ways to just go straight around it.

1. VPN, they will never be able to stop this, if they even tried to implement some vpn blocking, business that use it for legitimate purposes would sue there asses.
2. SSL encrypted email.
3. Proxy servers.

I could list the other numerous channels for sharing data that wont be filtered but im sure you get the point.

But the problem is you cant even begin to explain these things to non-technical people, they have no idea how the net works in the backend, all they know about the internet is web sites and email.

And the biggest problem is the fact that it will give some people a false sense of security. "the filter will protect my child when they are on the internet", anyone will still be able to go into chat rooms and solicite young children, the filter wont stop any of that.

All the while conroy will go on tv and crap on about reports showing that the filter is blocking 98.5% of RC material, or whatever bulls*** figure they make up and conclude that its all a giant success and the christian people will be happy becuase as far as they know the internet is now G rated.

What they are trying to do just cant be done and its a giant waste of f***en money, the child protection agency's should be pissed of that money is being wasted when it could be going into actualy tracking down peadophiles, but they arent, and its becuase they also have no f***en idea how the internet works, and conroy has told them that he can block the peadophiles and they beleive it for some reason.

$44 million dollars could be spent on A LOT of cops dedicated to tracking down paedophile rings...