LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Glen Turner <glen.turner@adelaide.edu.au>
  To  : linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au
  Date: Thu, 02 Sep 1999 04:46:29 +0000

Re: Australian Censorship.. the whole world is talking about us now..

Toby Corkindale wrote, correcting yet another misreporting
by Slashdot:

> From what I understood of that article there is nothing about the ISP
> filtering for you for $5. I think they mean that the ISP bulk buys
> netnanny-like software, and resells it to you for $5.
> It would be rather hard to implement "selective filtering" - imagine
> that you would have to check the users username before you decide
> whether or not to filter them...
> 
> Anyway, it sounds good though..A nice pay of passing the buck.

Yes, but that's exactly the problem -- as if internet access
isn't hard enough to set up now.  ISP means Internet *Service*
Provider.  Passing the complexity onto the customer is in nobody's
interest.  ISPs might want to consider that their help desk costs
already form a significant component of their staffing budgets.

And just where do I find a client-side filter for my wireless PDA?

And where do large organisations that want to do proxy-based
filtering find stop lists.  This is especilly needed if that
organisation is listed in the, say, NetNanny stoplist.  I
imagine the National Council on AIDS could have this problem.

The scheme also excacerbates the problems with the right-wing
morals of filter software authors.  Essentially the IIA Code
says that stop lists reflecting strict puritan morals *must*
be used.

A good example of the uselessness of the scheme is an organisation,
such as a private hospital, that wants to access information on
sexual assult counselling.  This might very well be in the NetNanny
stop list (after all the National Organization for Women is).
It wouldn't by banned by the Australian Film and Literature
Classification board, but they are not the compilers of the stop
list that the Code-signing ISP insists that they use.

Note that ISPs that want state govt customers must offer selective
filtering.  State govts are exempt from the legislation for
consitutional reasons.

Cheers,
glen

-- 
 Glen Turner                               Network Specialist
 Tel: (08) 8303 3936          Information Technology Services
 Fax: (08) 8303 4400         The University of Adelaide  5005
 Email: glen.turner@adelaide.edu.au           South Australia

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