2-07-08, 9:32 am

Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) has attacked a federal government plan, championed by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, that would mandate 'clean feed' filtered internet connections to all homes and schools. The scheme, which will supposedly censor pornography and other 'inappropriate material' on the internet, goes further than the former Howard government policies, by requiring individuals to opt-out of the scheme rather than request filtering from their service provider.

'Waving the ‘save the children’ flag may be good politics, but it ignores serious technological problems which will likely cause the proposed scheme to fail', said EFA Chair Dale Clapperton. 'Furthermore, Australia is supposed to be a liberal democracy where adults have the freedom to say and read what they want, not just what the government decides is ‘appropriate’ for them.

'These announcements smack of the condescending paternalism which contributed to the downfall of the Howard government,' Clapperton continued. 'The proposals threaten the free speech rights of every Australian, and our concerns will not be silenced by government sound bites equating free speech with access to child pornography.'

While the Minister makes no apologies for this alarming development, he has given us little reason to put our faith in his bureaucrats to administer such a system competently, transparently and fairly.

'Who decides what is ‘appropriate’ for adult Australians to read on the internet, and according to what standards?', asked Clapperton. 'What will happen if the government decides that information about abortion or gay marriage is ‘inappropriate’ at the behest of Family First Senator Steve Fielding?'

In an attempt to dismiss the policy’s critics, Senator Conroy said 'If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd-Labor government is going to disagree.' EFA notes, however, that child pornography is already illegal, and very unlikely to come to the attention of either the casual web user or the censors themselves. 'Senator Conroy’s attempt to equate freedom of speech with access to child pornography is a transparent attempt to deter criticism of this fundamentally flawed proposal.' said Clapperton.

Implementation of the proposal, insofar as it is technically possible, would cause significant technical and administrative headaches for Australia’s internet service providers. 'This can only have the effect of making Australians’ access to the internet slower and more expensive,' said Clapperton. 'Given the Prime Minister’s election promise to focus on improving the nation’s access to broadband, the fact that the first measures put in place should do the exact opposite is as disappointing as it is bewildering.'

With billions of web pages available on the internet and changing every day, the crucial technical and administrative details of how the clean feed will be created have not yet been made available.

Although the Minister has asserted that the internet will not 'grind to a halt,' he has yet to explain to internet engineers how he plans to accomplish a feat that experts acknowledge would be very difficult. 'Anyone with a better understanding of the internet than the Minister will tell you this system simply will not work,' said Clapperton. 'But a lot of taxpayers’ money will be wasted if we try.'

From The Guardian