I’ve been very busy this week following Tuesday’s announcement that mandatory ISP-level Internet “filtering” will go ahead, writing stories for Crikey and ABC Online.

Two stories for Crikey:

• Conroy’s internet filter: so what? Senator Conroy’s claim that “ISP-level filtering of a defined list of URLs can be delivered with 100% accuracy” is perhaps true in a narrow technical sense, but it misrepresents the Enex TestLab report. And it ignores Enex’s finding that “a technically competent user could, if they wished, circumvent the filtering technology.”
• Internet filtering: first step on the path to Burma? Not just my fear, but that of retired High Court Justice Michael Kirby. I also point out how the existing censorship system has extended the definition of Refused Classification — that is, banned material — three times in the last decade, often without public consultation. Such scope creep is a worry.

And my first outing for ABC’s The Drum — well, for Unleashed, there’s still some unresolved branding issues — is Evidence-based policy? Not on this filter! I argue that the mandatory filtering program isn’t about “protecting the children” at all.

A sample:

If the plan were really about protecting the children, and if it were really evidence-based, the government would have first have figured out what risks children actually face — online and everywhere else. They’d then figure out the best methods of countering those risks. Then they’d figure out the most cost-effective ways of implementing those solutions.

If we did that, we’d probably find that the risks are the very same ones that child protection experts keep banging on about. Bullying by their peers. Abuse from within their own homes and families. Poverty and its associated health risks. Obesity.

But this is politics, not child protection.

This policy is probably about a Senate preferences deal between Labor and Family First. It’s certainly about the political demands of a small but vocal and well-connected minority of conservative Christian voters and the devilishly evil internet.

The political solution has already been chosen: compulsory censorship by an automatic filter. The political goal is to sell that policy to the voters.

The comments threads on all articles is revealing fascinating stuff. Please read. And comment.

That’s all link to my recent stuff. In part 2 I’ll link to some of the other clever writing on this issue.

Yes, Australia will have a mandatory ISP-level Internet censorship system. It was announced earlier today by Senator Stephen Conroy, the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy when he released the final report of the recent filtering trials.

According to the ABC News report, legislation will be introduced into Parliament next year which will require all ISPs to block material hosted in other countries which has been refused classification. That’s actualy not quite correct. It will block material which, in the opinion of an ACMA staff member, would potentially be refused classification if it were actually submitted to the Classification Board.

Provided, that is, that a concerned citizen went to the trouble of complaining about the material in the first place.

I’m still ploughing through the final report from Enex Testlab for a couple media articles I need to write tonight.

Meanwhile, have a listen to this 10-minute interview I did earlier today with Jason Jordan on Radio 6PR Perth.

[The radio interview is Copyright © 2009 Radio 6PR Perth Pty Ltd, but since they don't archive these interviews it's fair enough putting it here provided you just listen to it and I link back to 6PR and encourage you to listen. If you're in Perth. Or if you want to stream it.]

A spokesman for the minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, confirmed that saying, “I can confirm that the Australian Communications and Media Authority has provided the Minister with a report on its trial of internet filtering technologies. The Government will consider the report and comment in due course.”

So, will the report be released?

Yesterday I suggested, “It’s a govt report. If results are what’s needed politically, we’ll get a summary. If not, we’ll never hear anything again… This is called responsible government, and what Kevin Rudd thinks is a new era of transparency and evidence-based policy. Bah!”

That is all… for now.

Yesterday was the deadline for purveyors of filters to register their interest with Enex TestLab, the Melbourne company running the trials. As they said in a newspaper ad:

We invite vendors of all types (hardware appliances, software — proprietary or open-source) of ISP-based internet content filters to participate.

The products will be tested in a “controlled environment” (i.e. the lab) in the first half of 2008, and then the “field trials” happen in the second half.

But looking at the original request for tender at AusTender, this “just” seems to be another exercise in seeing what’s available in the marketplace, rather than providing a “solution” [ugh!] which implements specific policy goals.

The successful tenderer will be responsible for establishing a test environment and reporting on:

• the effectiveness of content filtering products at the ISP level in blocking illegal and inappropriate content;
• determining whether the operation of content filtering products at the ISP level would introduce delays into an ISP’s network;
• an analysis of the features presently available in content filtering products at the ISP level; and
• what capabilities current products have in regards to filtering non web-based content.

In one sense this is all well and good: the government is evaluating products before purchase. That certainly makes a change from the previous government’s purchase of Super Hornets! But a really, really important step has been skipped: defining the policy goal in clean, unambiguous and testable form.

No-one seems to be willing or able to explain “inappropriate”.

And maybe that’s the point. It’s the government’s job to create the laws that we want and administer them, not make value judgements about “propriety” — which is about “conventionally accepted standards of behaviour or morality”.

And why is the government treating the Internet so differently from other communication media?

As Rick Welykochy said earlier today:

I’d bet my lunch that most Australian parents consider that violence on TV and film is not appropriate for children and probably does cause some behavioural harm.

If this government is going to embark on a journey of censoring broadcast media like the Internet, it would only seem logical that they also do the same for all broadcast media. To single out just one medium would be hypocritical and politically self-serving, with reduced benefit to society. Or one would think.

Which begs the question of how we currently protect children from inappropriate content. Would it be that up to now, adult supervision has been adequate in providing this protection? And why cannot the same supervision be provided for the Internet?

Why indeed. Any theories? Might it maybe have something to do with the fact that politicians still see the “old media” proprietors as powerful brokers, people who wouldn’t take kindly to suggestions of a compulsory filter on TV sets?