The biggest news for the filter in a while with Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey choosing JJJ’s Hack program to announce that the Coalition will not back the Conroy Curtain whether or not they win government. Due to the makeup of the Senate (both before and in all probability after the election) this might mean the policy is effectively dead. If you’re not up to speed, here I explain why:

Also on the dreaded filter, my video about “Five ways to get around the filter in 2 minutes” was chosen to be Crikey’s video of the day.

I did a short spot on Channel 7’s “The Morning Show” (which was helpfully  captured by a supporter on the web).

The issue surrounds this story that details how the Government have been secretly lobbying ISPs to come up with a new and far-reaching data retention system. This would oblige ISPs to preserve logs all all activities – up to and possibly including things like proxy logs that would detail web browsing history – in case they are needed in a criminal investigation.

What I didn’t get to say on the spot below – which was cut shorter than I expected due to a story about Orlando Bloom’s honeymoon – is that the real privacy risks come from the potential for data breaches and possibly rogue employees. Once these large databases exists, there can be no guarantee about what will happen with them; history has shown us that. Therefore the onus is on the Government to demonstrate why they would be necessary. Rather than do that, they have conducted the discussions in the utmost secrecy, and journalist Ben Grubb’s FOI request yielded a ridiculously paltry result – apparently due to fears  of sparking a “premature unnecessary debate”.

Can debate about a far-reaching policy like this ever be unnecessary? Is it premature when the Attorney-General’s department is already in meetings with your ISP?

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

Today was officially “Quit Facebook Day”, whereby 24,000 users – out of 400 million – threatened to quit over privacy issues. I was on “The Circle” today to discuss the issue – and it was good fun. Watch below.

As some of those close to me will know, I have recently resigned my membership in the ALP and joined the Greens. Although it might seem a sudden move to some, it has been a long time coming and was not an easy decision or one taken lightly. I’m still new to the party, but I have learned enough to know that I have definitely made the right decision. If you’re curious as to my reasons and experiences, please read on.

Why I joined the Labor Party

I don’t have a background in student politics – I came to political involvement much later in life. I joined the ALP when I lived in California. My political consciousness, while probably not underdeveloped compared to the average voter, was prodded by the continuing outrages of John Howard and George Bush. By the time the Tampa affair, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay were all unfolding, I felt something had to be done – if for no other reason but to feel a little less powerless.

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