Stephen Conroy, as usual on a Friday, made some major filter announcements today, using the excuse of a review of the “RC” classification category to put the filter on the back burner for 12 months. He also announced that three large ISPs – Bigpond, Optus and Primus – would begin a voluntary filtering scheme. Although that raises some red flags, it would be definitely preferable to having a compulsory government-controlled scheme. However, it looks like the old plan is still very much in the offing.

Read more on the SMH here, or listen to me discussing the issue on the ABC:

ABC – The World Today

Four Corners tonight tackled internet censorship in an episode entitled “Access Denied”. For a debate ruled, like most debates, by sound bites – “child pornography”, “censored like North Korea” – I was excited to see the issue get a detailed examination over 40-odd minutes of quality investigative journalism.

I thought they did a good job. There was, as usual in this discussion, much emphasis on the evil content on the internet without really pointing out how the vast majority of people use the internet the vast majority of the time without any unpleasantness whatsoever. There was, for some reason, a lot of filler shots of porn sites themselves. But several sides of the debate got an airing that we wouldn’t normally hear. At about 12 minutes in, teenager Justin Katz is asked about whether kids need to be protected from nasty material, and he says exactly what you’d expect from a sane person: “I think if you just have common sense and the right attitude you don’t need to be protected from anything, that with just a straight mind you’ll know what’s right and you’ll know what’s wrong.”

The pro-filter camp included some of the usual suspects like Jim Wallace and Clive Hamilton. Clive did not disappoint with his rhetoric about “perverse and extreme sexual practices”. The phrase “penetrated in every orifice” quickly made an appearance along with “bestiality” and “copraphilia.” (Eww. I start to worry about what’s on Clive’s hard drive for research purposes.) Unfortunately for my self-image someone on twitter pointed out that Clive and I look somewhat similar: “Clive Hamilton and Colin Jacobs are both bald w/glasses. But Clive has the look of a man who doesn’t get laid much.” Thanks, @renailemay.

I also though the producers did a good job highlighting the democratic dangers and putting the lie to the government’s “child pornography” rhetoric by showing some much more controversial material that would be blocked, and is currently prohibited. The oldies learning about proxies and the outraged anti-abortion candidate certainly illustrated this important point.

I also found it surprising that they discussed how the current classification scheme applies to normal adult material, with Fiona Patten of the Australian Sex Party showing the audience how some pirate porn needs to split the swashbuckling violence onto a separate DVD to the piratical sex in order to pass classification muster. I think most Aussies have little problem with the idea of adults being able to watch this sort of harmless material, and it was a good and light-hearted counterbalance to the worst-of-the-worst rhetoric we normally get.

I’m in there with a couple of grabs about how the filter was presented to the electorate and how it has since changed. Mark Newton had better material with his final line, though (spoiler alert): “The idea that the internet is this scary place that parents don’t understand, that everyone needs protection from, isn’t a view that’s held by  most of society . What it really is is a scary place that politicians don’t understand and politicians need protection from, and that’s why we’re having this debate now.”

You can watch the show at the Four Corners site or on ABC iView.

The topic was also discussed on Q&A after Four Corners. Kaiser Kuo, who I have followed and read since living in China, had me worried but actually proved to be an eloquent opponent of censorship under all but the most extraordinary circumstances. A poll of the audience showed the overwhelming majority against the filter. Brett Solomon stuck up for us internet-loving nerds with genuine passion. Definitely worth checking out on iView.

I have an opinion piece in today’s Age, expanding on the theme of offensive internet content: do we need Rudd to step in and save us? I’m seeing more and more panic, fanned by the media, and a sense of proportion is quickly being lost.

This also continues on my new favourite theme, “Why should the Internet be any different?” I particularly dislike this sentence, often uttered by Senator Conroy, as it so clearly has a number of obvious answers explaining why the Internet is fundamentally different to other media. More on that later.

The online version of the piece is available here.

Conroy will be facing questions about the filter on ABC Radio National’s “Australia Talks” show at 6pm today, and I’ll be there to ask a few of my own.

Conroy faced the public tonight on Channel 10’s The 7PM Project. I gave my input and let fly a few sound bites for the lead-in piece, but the interesting bit is the discussion that follows. The producers and hosts of the show were well-informed, and asked the tough questions. They demonstrated that filtering won’t help parents, nor will it stop illegal material. Conroy was left with nowhere to go but to rabbit on about RC material.

If Conroy is now reduced to defending the filter as an expensive and complex way to harmonise the classification scheme, it’s a debate he can’t easily win, but I’d be happy to have.

He also repeats a line I love to hate – “How is the internet any different?” I’ve written about this before (most recently, this week at EFA) and will have more to say on the subject. Suffice it to say, the internet is different, in so many fundamental ways. The fact that the Communications Minister doesn’t realise this should worry every Australian.

Here’s a video of tonight’s segment:

The campaign against mandatory internet filtering, which any loyal reader will know has consumed a good portion of my life these last few years, has heated up in recent days in exciting ways.

Reporters Without Borders (Reporters Sans Frontieres, RSF), after writing an open letter to Kevin Rudd late last year, last week added Australia to an “under surveillance” list of countries showing worrying trends in the field of Internet censorship. Although it doesn’t label Australia an “Internet Enemy” like China, Cuba or North Korea, it is a clear expression that our move down this path is viewed with alarm by those overseas concerned with freedom of expression. The Government is sensitive on this issue, and the Minister took issue with my reporting of the open letter in Crikey last December, firing off a volley to Crikey shortly thereafter.

In a clear sign that we have really touched a nerve, Senator Conroy has attacked both EFA and myself for our campaign in the Senate this week. After having a clear go at EFA for “misleading” RSF in question time Monday (summary here, including my rebuttal; also covered in ZDNet) on Tuesday he lambasted myself, and my colleagues at EFA for what he calls a “disgraceful misinformation campaign”.

Following the government’s announcement last year, civil libertarian group Electronic Frontiers Australia repeated the claims of reporters without borders in an article written by its CEO Colin Jacobs in Crikey. While one could possible excuse Reporters Without Borders for being ignorant of the government’s policy, the same cannot be said of the locally run EFA who through Colin Jacobs, chairman Nic Suzor, and board member Geordie Guy, have run a campaign to deliberately mislead the Australian public.

They have argued there is no child abuse material traded on the open internet yet the latest count there were 355 child abuse URLs on the ACMA blacklist and therefore the open internet.

They have argued that filtering will slow the internet and will result in over blocking despite the independent live pilot trial showing that internet filtering can be done…

Here’s Hansard, or an audio clip of this question time snippet. I believe the Crikey article in question may have in fact have been tabled. A document detailing our purported lies was tabled.

The issues the Minister mentions are ones I am comfortable debating. Although others have used the slowing of internet speeds as an argument against the filter, since the filter’s details became known I have been careful to avoid this topic as I don’t believe it is a major factor. Of course, there is child pornography on the open internet; just not very much, and the evidence shows it does not remain there for long. Nor would the filter prevent deliberate access. I am therefore not inclined to modify my arguments based on this broadside.

Despite the seriousness of the charges, this is good news. Not only does the legislation appear to be temporarily delayed, the Minister has all but conceded our campaign against the filter has succeeded in swaying public opinion. Because we have swayed it against the filter, he has labelled it misleading, basically accusing us of lying to the public. We, of course, don’t see it that way, and will stick to our guns.

I am proud to take part in what appears to be a tradition; EFA has managed to equally piss off one or two of Conroy’s predecessors. This document details EFA’s response, via the Senate Privileges Committee, to remarks made by Senator Alston in 1999.  The situation was much the same, with the Howard government coming under criticism by the ACLU for internet censorship plans. Senator Alston accused EFA of being “low grade, undergraduate political activists” and “maniacs”. “Misleading” seems a bit tame by comparison.

There’s a depressing cycle repeating itself in the Australian news. Something nasty happens. The media report the outcry about how nasty it is. Then comes the depressing bit; the politicians, wanting to be seen to respond to the confected crisis, propose some sort of ill-thought-out, knee-jerk regulation to mitigate it.

A good example is Senator Nick Xenophon’s reaction to the tragic murder of Carly Ryan. Apparently, her killer lied about his age online to entice her into a meeting. The Senator’s proposal, therefore, was to outlaw lying about your age to minors online. Can anything be said in defence of such a proposal? Never mind that the crime is vanishingly rare. Isn’t it enough that rape and murder are already illegal? How many murderers would balk at a little lie, legal or not, in pursuit of a victim?

The trend is worse when it comes to the internet. Recently we’ve had flaps about racist speech, and do you remember the furore over a stupid web game called “Muslim Massacre”? If there is a politician who can resist the temptation to forcefully condemn something so obviously tasteless, I’ve yet to see one.

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If you’re a politician, and something nasty is brought to your attention, what do you do? The best and sometimes only tool in your toolbox is the one you reach for. The tool is this: to pass a law banning it. Therefore, although it’s always discouraging, a story like this one, is far from unusual or surprising. ”Laws to tackle racism on the Internet are set to be beefed up,” it announces.

“Authorities warn they are often powerless to act against online content, which is responsible for almost one in five racial vilification complaints,” it continues, then:

Attorney-General Robert McClelland has ordered the Australian Human Rights Commission to conduct a sweeping review of ”arrangements for dealing with racist material on the internet”.

”While freedom of expression is one of the most fundamental rights, this is not at the expense of the rights of people, while using the Internet, to be treated with equality, dignity and respect,” Mr McClelland told The Sunday Age.

Certainly, nobody likes hate speech. But these words, by our Attorney-General, are concerning. Firstly, they show a terrible lack of  consideration of the complexities of the issue, and secondly, they demote freedom of speech in a significant way.

Banning racist content on the Internet might seem like a good idea on the surface, but you don’t have to dig very deep before the idea becomes problematic. The existing laws throughout the states grapple with some thorny issues. How do you define hate speech? “Kill all Jews” certainly counts, but what about “Liberate Palestine”? Is Holocaust revisionism hate speech? What about an honestly held  opinion on the undesirability of immigration from a certain part of the world? Does this inspire “hatred, contempt or severe ridicule” against a group of persons? These ambiguities will become more problematic if a new national law is introduced that applies to every blog on the Internet.

The proposal also shows a considerable lack of understanding about the realities of censoring the Internet. The Internet, it should go without saying, is global. Billions of web pages are out there, far beyond the reach of Australian lawmakers, and reflecting a multitude of different cultural values. Content hosted in Australia can be removed, but it can just as easily be moved or copied overseas by its authors. It is therefore questionable whether any law could have a meaningful impact.

The comments by the AG and others pay lip service to freedom of speech, but their words lack conviction. Freedom of speech is fine, but “not at the expense of the rights of people… to be treated with equality, dignity and respect.” That sounds like a noble sentiment, but are we certain that freedom of speech shouldn’t include the right to be mocking, disrespectful and offensive? There are definitely limits to freedom of speech that we can all agree on. But the above comments seem more like a dismissal of free-speech concerns than a debate of their merits.

We need to ask ourselves, is this the best way to tackle racism in Australian society? Is racist web content a cause of racist attitudes, or merely a symptom of it? In our view, other, more substantive and community-based policies are needed if we want to see a real improvement in this area.

Recently the trends in Internet freedom have been all bad. China’s censorship regime escalated dramatically over the last 12 months, with a more aggressive Golden Shield, tumultuous events in Iran and of course Australia’s own filtering plan. It is therefore extremely heartening to see the tough new stand on Internet freedom taken by the USA.

The new approach was outlined last week in a speech by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who declared the free access to information online as critical a human right as the freedom of assembly or the right to publish. Although barely mentioning China in her speech, Clinton was clearly setting the stage for a showdown with Beijing, declaring that “countries or individuals that engage in cyber attacks should face consequences.” The Chinese government responded angrily, declaring the Chinese internet “open”, demanding the U.S. “respect the facts” and calling the speech”information imperialism” in an official newspaper.

This is a pretty bad look for the Rudd government. It is my belief that they thought the filtering plan would be relatively uncontroversial, would wedge the opposition, and would allow them to check a few boxes to do with election promises and helping kids. Suddenly, they find themselves swimming against a rapidly accelerating tide.

Senator Conroy, I believe, hates it when Australia is compared to China in these sorts of debates. Conroy has no plan to censor political speech in Australia (I certainly believe this), so he sees any comparison to China or Iran as a cheap shot, dishonest and unfair. I think it simply doesn’t occur to him that the system itself is a danger. If you created a secret police force with the express purpose of weeding out terrorists amongst the population, would that be of concern if that was the extent of their mission? Of course it would. People are people, and regularly exceed their mission or their authority. (It’s happened before here – google “special branch” and “cold war”.)

To borrow a phrase from Bruce Schneier, it’s bad civic hygiene to allow our rights to be eroded without an excellent reason. In a free democracy the default position should always be to preserve openness and transparency. The government needs to make a watertight case if they want to take new powers onto themselves.

That case can’t be made for Internet filtering, and the Government knows it. This explains the amusingly defensive tone of Friday’s media release. It’s pure, panicked spin.

I made similar comments to the ABC on Friday. My full take on the subject can be found over at EFA here, or in today’s Crikey here.

In a debate as nuanced as the one against filtering, it can be hard to penetrate the sound bites about kids and get some focus on the real policy underneath. With the filtering moving from policy to law, though, we can hope that scrutiny will increase. Here are my suggestions (over at EFA) for some urgent questions that need answering.