INTERNET 2 - The Imminent Privatization of the World Wide Web / Censorship

[mr anderson]

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=703330

The federal government has distanced itself from a report that found internet censorship technology under consideration is seriously flawed.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy says the Internet Industry Association (IIA) report was commissioned and paid for by the former Howard government.

It was "not an analysis of the ALP's policy", he said.

The report concluded schemes to block inappropriate content - such as child pornography - could slow the internet and result in over- and under-blocking of material.

Senator Conroy denied Labor was trialling the technology in spite of the report's negative findings.

"The government is aware of technical concerns raised in the report, and that is why we are conducting a pilot, to put these claims to the test," Senator Conroy said in a statement.

"The live pilot trial will provide evidence on the real world impacts of content filtering, including for providers and internet users.

"It will provide an invaluable opportunity for internet service providers to inform the government's approach."

The trial is due to begin in mid-January.

Senator Conroy said the IIA report simply involved reviewing existing literature and interviews and surveys.

"It involved no empirical testing of filtering technology."

[mr anderson]

http://www.dbcde.gov.au/communications_for_business/industry_development/digital_economy/future_directions_blog/topics/civil_and_confident_society_online

22 Dec 2008

To achieve our goal of maximising the participation of Australian businesses and individuals in the digital economy, it is important that the Government and industry collaborate to ensure that people are as confident to interact and engage via the internet as they are offline. Consumers with digital confidence will increasingly find information online, communicate and interact via the internet and shop online. Businesses that have digital confidence will expand their online service offerings. The question we need to ask is 'how we can all work together to inspire online confidence?'

To give Australian households the necessary confidence, the Government is working to promote an online civil society through its $125.8 million Cyber-Safety Plan. This contains a comprehensive set of measures to combat online threats and help parents and educators protect children from inappropriate material.

It includes funding for:

    * education and information measures
    * law enforcement
    * helplines and websites
    * ISP filtering
    * consultative arrangements with industry, child protection bodies and children
    * further research to identify possible areas for further action.

One element of this program is the Government's proposal to introduce internet service provider- (ISP-) level internet filtering. I'm aware that this proposal has attracted significant debate and criticism—on this blog and at other places in the blogosphere. I'm following the debate at sites like Whirlpool and GetUp and on Twitter at #nocleanfeed.

The Government takes the issue of cyber-safety extremely seriously and welcomes public debate about how we can achieve our goal of protecting children from harmful internet content. We wouldn't have set up this site (or published negative comments on it) if we were trying to close down discussion.

I can assure everyone who is participating in this debate that the Government is taking an evidence-based approach to implementing its cyber-safety policy. I'm aware of technical concerns some have raised with filtering technology. The Government further understands that the potential extent of ISP filtering is inherently related to the technical capabilities of filtering solutions. International experience suggests that index-based filtering of a central blacklist is technically feasible. Broader, dynamic analysis filtering of internet content, on the other hand, has raised some issues in the past. The Government is currently testing the effectiveness of these technical solutions in the current live trial. The results of this trial will inform the Government's approach to this issue.

Elsewhere on this site you can find further information about the Government's ISP Content Filtering Live Pilot.

We are happy to have an open debate about these technical issues. However, the Government does not view this debate as an argument about freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech is fundamentally important in a democratic society and there was never any suggestion that the Australian Government would seek to block political content. In this context, claims that the Government's policy is analogous to the approach taken by countries such as Iran, China and Saudi Arabia are not justified.

Australian society has always accepted that there is some material which is not acceptable, particularly for children. That is why we have the National Classification Scheme for classifying films, computer games, publications and online content. Australian ISPs are already subject to regulation that prohibits the hosting of certain material based upon the Scheme. For many years, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has had the power to issue a 'take-down' notice requiring that prohibited content hosted in Australia be removed, blocked from public access or hosted from behind a restricted access system, depending on the content involved. All the Government is now seeking to do is to examine how technology can assist in filtering internationally-hosted content.

As we've said since this blog was opened, the Government is experimenting with a new form of consultation and a new level of openness in this medium.

Robert Merkel, a frequent contributor to one of Australia's largest independent blogs, Lavartus Prodeo, noted in the comments for the first topic on this blog that:

Congratulations on the establishment of this blog; it is indeed an interesting experiment that I hope goes welll. It is important, if you want to make a go of it, that it genuinely is a two-way process. Of course, there will be occasions where the tone of comments on this blog strongly oppose some policy that the government decides to take. It is essential o the success of the project that an effort is made to engage those who respectfully and thoughfully disagree with you. If that does not occur, the inevitable conclusion will be that the "blog" is just a venue for press releases.

Posted by Robert Merkel / 10 Dec 2008 7:39am / Permalink

In this spirit, I'll use this post to respond to some of the questions and comments on ISP filtering that were left throughout the blog. Before that, however, I want to make sure everyone understands three things:

   1. Unfortunately, given the total number of comments, we can't respond to every comment in this format (nor do most bloggers respond to every comment on every post).
   2. I've tried to respond here to themes that have appeared in the comments on multiple occasions. In this context, given that most comments addressed multiple topics, I've only reproduced the text that is relevant to each theme at the start of each response. I've included a permalink for each quoted comment so you can see everything that commenter had to say if you want.
   3. I hope to respond to more themes in the comments in the future—so keep your comments coming on this post.

With that in mind, let's get into the discussion.

Stephen Conroy
Responses to comments

    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageThis is an attack on freedom of speech
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageWhy aren’t PC-level filters sufficient?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageHow will the blacklist be maintained?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageWhy won’t the Government publish what is included in the ACMA blacklist?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageHow does ACMA determine what sites will be included on the blacklist?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageHasn’t the Government already undertaken a trial of the technical issues surrounding internet filtering? Didn’t this trial find that filtering was not effective?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageWon’t internet filtering reduce internet speeds?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageInternet filtering won’t stop peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic—so why bother?
    * This link opens a DBCDE web pageSo what else is the Government doing to help protect children online?

[mr anderson]

http://www.itwire.com/content/view/22440/127/1/1/

Alex Zaharov-Reutt   
Tuesday, 23 December 2008

Earlier this morning, Australian Shadow Minister for Communications, Senator Nick Minchin, put out a press release accusing the Minister for Communications, Senator Stephen Conroy, of “burying” a report into ISP filtering – but surprise, surprise, the report is now available for anyone to read.

The news concerning Internet filtering and censorship in Australia just keeps getting worse, with the Federal Government now proposing to include (P2P) peer-to-peer and BitTorrent into the filtering trial, something that could greatly impact on legitimate uses of these services.

There are also reports that ISPs such as iiNet, who have volunteered to be part of the ISP filtering trial, haven’t yet received any instructions from the Government on how to participate, despite the Government saying it wanted the trial to start before the end of 2008, a date that draws ever closer with each passing day.

It’s also a date that has now been scrapped entirely, with the live filtering trial now due to begin in mid-January, as noted on page 2.

Earlier this morning, Australia’s Shadow Minister for Communications, Senator Nick Minchin, put out a release demanding that “Communications Minister Stephen Conroy should today publicly release an expert study, which he has kept buried since February, and is reportedly damning of the type of Internet Service Provider (ISP) level filtering being proposed by [the Federal] Labor [Government].”

Details of where the report can be found are on page 2, as the report has now been released, but what Senator Minchin had to say sounds pretty damning, and is worth reading.

This morning, Senator Minchin said: “It would seem the report, 'Feasibility Study of ISP Level Content Filtering', which was a joint Government and industry initiative, has been kept secret because it casts further serious doubts over the centralised Internet filtering system that Senator Conroy is looking to mandate.”

Senator Minchin’s statement noted that the report said “centralised mandatory filtering will "significantly slow Internet speeds", inadvertently block acceptable content and be ineffective against peer-to-peer file sharing networks, chat rooms, email and instant messaging.”

In addition, the report said: “entire user-generated content sites such as YouTube and Wikipedia could be blocked because of a single suspect posting.”

Senator Minchin said: "The fact Senator Conroy has kept this expert study buried for 10 months, during a period when debate has been raging about Labor's divisive and deeply unpopular plan to introduce mandatory, ISP-level filtering, is extraordinary and totally unacceptable”, and Senator Minchin has tried getting the report released “under Freedom of Information” rules.

Senator Minchin continued: “It would appear this report has not been released, simply because it raises further serious and legitimate technical concerns about Labor's policy. While many questions have been asked of the Minister over several months, Senator Conroy has been deliberately evasive, vague and cryptic about the detail of this controversial proposal.

"This comes when serious doubts are also being cast over the credibility and efficacy of the Government's planned 'live' filtering trials which are having trouble getting off the ground because of a lack of support.

"It must also be highlighted that on 31 December the Rudd Labor Government will recklessly close the online safety program established by the previous Coalition Government, which sees Australian families given the option of obtaining free, PC-level filters, which can be tailored to the needs of individual households," Senator Minchin concluded.

However, surprise surprise – the report is now available, with full details from a media release by Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy.

Hours after Senator Minchin’s demand appeared, a media release appeared at Senator Stephen Conroy’s Ministerial website.

http://www.minister.dbcde.gov.au/media/media_releases/2008/101

Entitled “Howard Government report into ISP filtering”, the statement notes:

“The Howard Government, at the instigation of the Internet Industry Association (IIA), commissioned a report to be conducted by Mr Peter Coroneos, IIAs, CEO.

“The previous government provided funding for the research and it was based on terms of reference agreed to by the IIA and the previous government. The report was to inform the previous government of the IIA's and other stakeholders' views, and international experience.

“The report methodology was a literature review of existing studies as well as interviews and surveys. It involved no empirical testing of filtering technology.

“The report highlighted a number of concerns the industry had previously raised with the current and previous governments, such as the potential for dynamic filtering to result in network performance impact and over-blocking and under-blocking content. It was not an analysis of the ALP's policy.”

Senator Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, said: "The Government is aware of technical concerns raised in the report, and that is why we are conducting a pilot to put these claims to the test.

"On 10 November I released an Expression of Interest seeking participation of ISPs and mobile telephone providers in a live pilot. A number of applications have been received from ISPs expressing interest in participating in the field pilot of ISP content filtering,” concluded the Minister.

The Senator’s media statement continues: “The live pilot trial will provide evidence on the real world impacts of ISP content filtering, including for providers and internet users. It will provide an invaluable opportunity for ISPs to inform the Government's approach.

“The pilot trial will not begin until mid-January and an announcement regarding participants will be made at that time.

“The Howard Government Report is on the Department website.”

So, it would appear Senator Stephen Conroy has bought himself some time to get the Internet filtering trial underway, and to inform all ISPs that wish to be part of the trial of their acceptance, and what they need to technically do for testing to begin.

Will 2009 be the year that Australian censorship of the Internet begins in earnest? It would seem so. How sad for freedom. What a win for wowserism and backwards, anti-Internet, anti-digital economy, anti-21st century... thinking!!

If Internet users would like to help Australia avoid becoming the “Soviet Socialist Republic of the South” complete with its own “Great Barrier Firewall Reef” it might be an idea to visit the GetUp! website and take part in its campaign to “Save the Net!”.

[mr anderson]

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/12/22/1229794328860.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

Asher Moses
December 23, 2008

'Not workable' ... Government report reveals flaws.

TRIALS of mandatory internet censorship will begin within days despite a secret high-level report to the Rudd Government that found the technology simply does not work, will significantly slow internet speeds and will block access to legitimate websites.

The report, commissioned by the Howard government and prepared by the Internet Industry Association, concluded that schemes to block inappropriate content such as child pornography are fundamentally flawed.

If the trials are deemed a success, the Government has earmarked $44 million to impose a compulsory "clean feed" on all internet subscribers in Australia as soon as late next year.

But the report says the filters would slow the internet - as much as 87 per cent by some measures - be easily bypassed and would not come close to capturing all of the nasty content available online. They would also struggle to distinguish between wanted and unwanted content, leading to legitimate sites being blocked. Entire user-generated content sites, such as YouTube and Wikipedia, could be censored over a single suspect posting.

This raises serious freedom of speech questions, such as who will be held accountable for blocked sites and whether the Government will be pressured to expand the blacklist to cover lawful content including pornography, gambling sites and euthanasia material.

The report, based on comprehensive interviews with many parties with a stake in the internet, was written by several independent technical experts including a University of Sydney associate professor, Bjorn Landfeldt. It was handed to the Government in February but has been kept secret.

"I definitely think that what the Government is showing publicly [it] is such a small part of what they need to do in order to get this right," Professor Landfeldt told the Herald.

He said he believed the Government had not released his report because its conclusions were too damaging.

"It's definitely not going to be workable to get a very significant reduction in access to this [unwanted] content that is available out there - it's fundamentally just not viable."

The Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy - despite his promises before Labor was elected that people would be able to opt out of any internet filters - has said the first tier of the Government's censorship policy will be compulsory for all. This would block all "illegal" and "inappropriate" material, as determined in part by a secret blacklist administered by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

A second tier would filter out content deemed harmful for children, such as pornography, but this would be optional for internet users.

Senator Conroy refused to comment directly on why the report has not been released or why the trials are going ahead given its findings.

The proposed censorship is more restrictive than in any liberal democracy, the online users lobby group, Electronic Frontiers Australia, says. It says the changes would put Australia on a par with oppressive regimes such as Iran and China.

But Senator Conroy said: "The Government intends to take an evidence-based approach to implementing its cyber-safety policy and has invited industry to participate in that process.

"This live pilot trial will provide evidence on the real-world impacts of ISP [internet service provider] content filtering, including for providers and internet users. It will provide an invaluable opportunity for ISPs to inform the Government's approach."

Professor Landfeldt, one of Australia's leading telecommunications experts, says some of the fundamental flaws of the scheme raised in his report include:

* All filtering systems will be easily circumvented using readily available software.

* Censors maintaining the blacklist will never be able to keep up with the amount of new content published on the web every second.

* Filters using real-time analysis of sites to determine whether content is inappropriate are not effective, capture wanted content, are easy to bypass and slow network speeds exponentially as accuracy increases.

* Entire user-generated content sites such as YouTube and Wikipedia could be blocked over a single video or article.

* Filters would be costly and difficult to implement for ISPs and put many smaller ISPs out of business.

* While the communciations authority's blacklist would be withheld from internet users, all 700 ISPs would have access to it, so it could easily be leaked.

* The filters would not censor content on peer-to-peer file sharing networks such as LimeWire, chat rooms, email and instant messaging;

* ISPs and the Government could be legally liable for the scheme's failures, particularly as content providers have no right to appeal against being blocked unnecessarily.

The Government is refusing to reveal details about its trials, even the names of the ISPs which have volunteered to be involved. Some will begin their six-week trials this week. All the trials will be completed by the middle of next year.

Australia's largest ISP, Telstra, and Internode have said they will not take part in the trials. The second-largest ISP, Optus, will run a scaled-back trial of just the first tier, while iiNet, the third-biggest provider, has said it will participate simply to show the Government that its scheme will not work.

The policy has attracted opposition from online consumers, lobby groups, ISPs, network administrators, some children's welfare groups, the Opposition, the Greens, NSW Young Labor and even the conservative Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, who famously tried to censor the chef Gordon Ramsay's swearing on television.

Professor Landfeldt says the censorship plan assumes websites will remain static, but as soon as the filtering system is in place many porn and other "unwanted" sites will change their designs to get around the filters, just as spammers can bypass email filters.

He said the filtering plan was "completely politicised".

The Greens Senator Scott Ludlam urged the Government to drop its "completely unhinged" policy which was "a waste of taxpayers funds". The Liberal Party's communications spokesman, Nick Minchin, said the Opposition would try to obtain the report under freedom of information laws.

[Brocke]

Russian bloggers report that FSB asks them to delete posts on protest rallies

Employees of the Federal Security Service (FSB) of the Russian Federation have addressed to moderators of the some Internet-communities with the request to delete messages of users on the protest rallies against increase of automobile duties, online paper NEWSru reports, referring to a moderator of Ru_auto online community.

"Administrators of ‘the very popular resource’ contacted me and very convincing asked me (and all other moderators) to delete henceforth posts on the theme of protest actions against duties on vehicles. They gave reason that supposedly no duties will exist, and our resource quite spoils their statistics of mood of people. You do not want that we will be suspended, don’t you?" the influenced moderator asked his colleagues.

Reports on mass protests appeared after the Russian government made a decision on increase from January 11, 2009, of the customs duties on foreign-made cars. It was announced that this measure was accepted with the purpose of support of the domestic companies during the economic crisis. The decision caused a wave of discontent among drivers of Primorye area, as in the area today more than 90 % of vehicles are made in Japan.

On December 14, two large unauthorized protest rallies paralysing departure of transport from Vladivostok took place in this Far Eastern city. Special-task police forces were used for suppression of protests; authorities declared that 61 person was arrested. The First deputy minister of interior Mikhail Suhodolsky declared that "attempts of carrying out of similar actions were taking place in Moscow, St.-Petersburg and Kaliningrad".

In October the National Anti-terrorism Committee (NAÊ) headed by the FSB Director Alexander Bortnikov, has proposed to develop the mechanism of state regulation "of public relations, connected with use of Internet”.

In August, Russia’s Kemerovo region branch of the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case at the request of the Federal Security Service's local branch into the activities of an opposition activist making comments on law enforcement officers in his Internet blog, The Moscow Times reported. The blogger, Dmitry Solovyov, coordinator of the Kemerovo region branch of the Oborona movement, faced up to two years in prison. Oborona's Moscow coordinator, Oleg Kozlovsky, said the case was an attempt to intimidate members of the movement, which has regularly participated in rallies staged by The Other Russia opposition coalition. Solovyov was suspected of libeling and inciting hatred against police and Federal Security Service officers in his posts on LiveJournal, according to Kozlovsky.

http://www.axisglobe.com/article.asp?article=1721

[Brocke]

http://www.speedguide.net/read_news.php?id=2736


Telstra out of Australian Web Filtering Trial

2008.12.08 10:44
by Philip

Telstra has decided not to participate in the government's controversial ISP filtering trial, for which expressions of interest were due today.

The company said its decision had been reached "primarily due to customer management issues" and stressed that Telstra More..would keep working with the government on filtering outside of the trial, including evaluating technology to block blacklists, since it had "no fundamental difficulties with a legislated regime for blocking a defined ACMA blacklist of illegal sites".

The six-week trial, which was scheduled to start 24 December, involves either just blocking access to websites on the Australian Communications and Media Authority's black list or additionally filtering non web-based applications such as peer-to-peer networks.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=7d9_1230102398

[mr anderson]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/12/24/2454789.htm

The Federal Opposition says it is not surprised the Government's mandatory internet filtering trial has been delayed.

The trial, which was meant to begin today, has been postponed until mid-January 2009 and the internet service providers (ISPs) who will participate will be announced at the same time.

ISPs iiNet and Optus both said yesterday they had not heard anything about their applications to participate in the trial, and doubted the Government would meet its own deadline.

iiNet's chief operating officer Mark White said yesterday he is sceptical about plans to filter the internet, and said the company was only participating to show the system would not work.

Opposition communications spokesman Nick Minchin says the delay in the proposed National Broadband Network shows the Government's poor track record with communications projects.

"I'm not surprised frankly, given this Government's bungling over communications issues generally," he told Radio National's Summer Breakfast program.

"We've seen the National Broadband Network just fade off into the distance and bedevilled by delays and procrastination, and we're seeing the same thing here.

"It's really the result of political manipulation prior to the election. The now-Government, then in opposition, made these broad sweeping promises about a National Broadband Network and ... eliminating child pornography from the internet.

"Now they've got to make good on their promise and they're finding it difficult."

He said he has no issue with the trial going ahead, but says the burden of proof now rests on Communications Minister Stephen Conroy to establish the trial is legitimate and that the results will be reliable.

Report released

Senator Conroy was unavailable to speak to the ABC today, but released a report commissioned by the Howard government into internet filtering.

The Internet Industry Association-produced report concluded that mandatory filtering would slow internet speeds, be easy to get around and would not block all undesirable material.

But Senator Conroy said the report included no empirical testing, instead relying on literature review, interviews and surveys.

Senator Minchin says he disagrees with Senator Conroy's attempt to devalue the report, saying it is an "insult to those involved".

[They] are leading experts in this field, particularly the lead author of the report," he said.

"[His] frustration with the Government in hiding this report led to the Fairfax newspapers having a detailed briefing on the content then forcing Senator Conroy last night to release the report 10 months after he received it.

"The report does identify some very, very serious issues with any attempt to impose this mandatory ISP-level filtering system, but it leads me to believe it's almost impossible to do this with any degree of effectiveness."

Opt-in system

Senator Minchin said his government commissioned the report to assess the viability of a voluntary system of filtering.

"The motive is good; obviously we want to prevent access to [child pornography]," he said.

"But we were more interested in whether you could have a system whereby ISPs offer this to their customers on a voluntary basis, an opt-in system.

"I don't think it ever occurred to us to mandate this, to force ISPs to impose this without their customers having any choice in the matter whatsoever."

Speed concerns

Senator Minchin said evidence that such a filtering system would drastically slow down internet speeds is a major problem with the idea.

"The laboratory trial that the Government conducted this year showed potential effect on speed of up to 87 per cent slowdown in the speed of the internet," he said.

"And this is from the Government that wants to install a National Broadband Network so we can all have high speed broadband," he added, laughing.

"I think that's a major flaw in the scheme but there are many, many others."

[mr anderson]

http://www.itwire.com/content/view/22459/1103/1/1/

Although due to begin on or before the 24th of December 2008, Australia’s draconian Internet content filter trials have now been postponed until mid-January 2009, with peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic filtering also set to be performed. Here’s an idea – delay to trial all right – but to mid-Jan, 2099!

Australia’s Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, has been running a blog at his departmental website over the past couple of weeks.

It wasn’t until the second-last day (Dec 22) of the blogging process that the topic of “Internet filtering” was actually raised, something that annoyed a great many public commenters (Australians) who took the time to offer their views to the Minister.

There was also much consternation that the time period for public comments at the blog would end at 3pm on December 23, giving Australians less than 48 hours to publicly comment on the Internet filtering topic as raised on the 22nd.

In that 22nd of December blog posting, a question was asked. That question was “How we can all work together to inspire online confidence?”.

Well, Minister. A good way to inspire confidence in the online world is not to filter and censor it out of existence. A good way is not to pretend that Australia’s filtering regime is nothing like that in China, Iran or Saudi Arabia. A good way is not to pretend that nothing else will ever be filtered, ever, besides child porn.

After all, censorship is an erosion of freedom. We already have laws against child pornography, we already have a dedicated police force doing its utmost to fight the threat, with wonderful success in recent times. We even have free Internet filters provided by NetAlert for any parent or school to install whenever they wish.

Another good way to inspire confidence online is not to “spring” the previously unannounced filtering of P2P (peer-to-peer) and BitTorrent traffic onto the public, as was done in the answer to the question “Internet filtering won’t stop peer to peer and bittorrent traffic so why bother”, where Senator Conroy noted that: “Technology that filters peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic does exist and it is anticipated that the effectiveness of this will be tested in the live pilot trial.”

Given the many legitimate and illegitimate uses of these two technologies, we can only hope that if this nightmarish filtration plan ever gets of the ground and onto the Australian world wide web, false positives are zero, or the “digital economy” may as well have the digital taken off the front of it.

At least we know Senator Stephen Conroy reads iTWire, as noted in the December 23 blog posting called “Thanks and so long...” where the Minister quoted iTWire journalist Stephen Withers, who said of the Minister's blog that: “the rules 'seem designed to keep the signal-to-noise ratio as high as possible, and that should encourage the maximum participation by real people (as opposed to link spammers and trolls, both of which are all too common in unmoderated spaces)'.”

But I note that none of my stories were quoted! Details on why, and why it's no surprise, questions on the legacy of Senator Stephen Conroy and sincere apologies to Ronald Reagan.

This, of course, is no real surprise.

After all, this blog has called Senator Stephen Conroy the “Minister for Censorship”.

It has noted that Whirlpoolers have derided Senator Conroy as “Senator Conjob”.

It has remarked upon how we might as well rename Australia the “Soviet Socialist Republic of the South”, and how the “Great Firewall of Australia” and the “Great Barrier Firewall Reef” is set to be imposed on Australians.

This blog has also utterly dismissed any notion that the Rudd Labor Government isn’t taking us down the path of China, Iran and Saudi Arabia, or that just because people are against filtering, it must mean that opponents are all supporters of child pornography.

Australians have watched in horror as the National Broadband Network (NBN) has been delayed time and again, with the 5-year timeframe for construction guaranteeing that whatever is built will be out of date by the time it is finished, given how fast technology moves.

There isn’t even any guarantee the current Government will still be in power by the time the NBN is complete.

Australians have also reacted in horror that the lucky, clever country could soon become the censored country. Australia ceased being a land of convicts long ago, enforcing filtration makes suspects out of every single Australian.

Why is Internet filtration the priority in a country still beset by the “tyranny of distance”, by high broadband prices, slow fraudband and a digital economy that still sees a brain drain of our best and brightest e-workers to Silicon Valley and other parts of the world?

Instead of opening Australia up to the world, we’re shutting it down. Censoring it off. Introducing uncertainty, slower speeds, false positives and bad political karma.

With apologies to Ronald Reagan... “Senator Stephen Conroy, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for Australia, if you seek liberalisation: Come here to this Internet gateway you propose! Mr. Conroy, open this gateway! Mr. Conroy, tear down this wall of proposed Internet filtering and censorship!”

None of us ever just want to be another brick in the wall, but bright, young and free Australians that will ensure the labels of the lucky, clever country stick throughout the 21st century and beyond.

The imposition of an Internet filter on Australia will transform our digital economy into a digital eCONomy.

Senator Conroy, is that what you truly want? Is that how you want to be remembered? Will this be your legacy?

[Brocke]

AUSTRALIA

Web spies monitor activists online for police, attorney-general - report

AAP

November 26, 2008 08:45am

    * Police hired company to spy on activists online - reports
    * Anti-war campaigners, environmental activists targeted
    * Clean feed: Greens could block plans for internet filter

A PRIVATE intelligence company has been engaged by police to secretly monitor internet and email use by activist and protest groups, a report says.

The company was hired to monitor and report on the internet activities of anti-war campaigners, animal rights activists, environmental campaigners, and other protest groups, Fairfax Media reported.

It was hired by Victorian Police, the Australian Federal Police and the federal Attorney-General's department.

The Melbourne-based firm has for the past five years monitored websites, online chat rooms, social networking sites, email lists and bulletin boards, the report said.

It has gathered intelligence on planned protests and other activities, and many of those on the watch list have broken no laws, the report said.

It also prepared threat assessments and intelligence reports for government agencies that included material from media reports, speeches, academic journals and publicly available company data, but no private correspondence was monitored.

The company was not named at the request of its management for fear extremists may target the firm.

The news comes a month after Victorian police were found to have targeted community and activist groups in a long-running covert operation.

http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,24709180-5014239,00.html

[Brocke]

Fatal flaws in website censorship plan, says report

Asher Moses
December 23, 2008

'Not workable' ... Government report reveals flaws.

TRIALS of mandatory internet censorship will begin within days despite a secret high-level report to the Rudd Government that found the technology simply does not work, will significantly slow internet speeds and will block access to legitimate websites.

The report, commissioned by the Howard government and prepared by the Internet Industry Association, concluded that schemes to block inappropriate content such as child pornography are fundamentally flawed.

If the trials are deemed a success, the Government has earmarked $44 million to impose a compulsory "clean feed" on all internet subscribers in Australia as soon as late next year.

But the report says the filters would slow the internet - as much as 87 per cent by some measures - be easily bypassed and would not come close to capturing all of the nasty content available online. They would also struggle to distinguish between wanted and unwanted content, leading to legitimate sites being blocked. Entire user-generated content sites, such as YouTube and Wikipedia, could be censored over a single suspect posting.

This raises serious freedom of speech questions, such as who will be held accountable for blocked sites and whether the Government will be pressured to expand the blacklist to cover lawful content including pornography, gambling sites and euthanasia material.

The report, based on comprehensive interviews with many parties with a stake in the internet, was written by several independent technical experts including a University of Sydney associate professor, Bjorn Landfeldt. It was handed to the Government in February but has been kept secret.

"I definitely think that what the Government is showing publicly �c is such a small part of what they need to do in order to get this right," Professor Landfeldt told the Herald.

He said he believed the Government had not released his report because its conclusions were too damaging.

"It's definitely not going to be workable to get a very significant reduction in access to this [unwanted] content that is available out there - it's fundamentally just not viable."

The Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy - despite his promises before Labor was elected that people would be able to opt out of any internet filters - has said the first tier of the Government's censorship policy will be compulsory for all. This would block all "illegal" and "inappropriate" material, as determined in part by a secret blacklist administered by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

A second tier would filter out content deemed harmful for children, such as pornography, but this would be optional for internet users.

Senator Conroy refused to comment directly on why the report has not been released or why the trials are going ahead given its findings.

The proposed censorship is more restrictive than in any liberal democracy, the online users lobby group, Electronic Frontiers Australia, says. It says the changes would put Australia on a par with oppressive regimes such as Iran and China.

But Senator Conroy said: "The Government intends to take an evidence-based approach to implementing its cyber-safety policy and has invited industry to participate in that process.

"This live pilot trial will provide evidence on the real-world impacts of ISP [internet service provider] content filtering, including for providers and internet users. It will provide an invaluable opportunity for ISPs to inform the Government's approach."

Professor Landfeldt, one of Australia's leading telecommunications experts, says some of the fundamental flaws of the scheme raised in his report include:

• All filtering systems will be easily circumvented using readily available software.
• Censors maintaining the blacklist will never be able to keep up with the amount of new content published on the web every second.
• Filters using real-time analysis of sites to determine whether content is inappropriate are not effective, capture wanted content, are easy to bypass and slow network speeds exponentially as accuracy increases.
• Entire user-generated content sites such as YouTube and Wikipedia could be blocked over a single video or article.
• Filters would be costly and difficult to implement for ISPs and put many smaller ISPs out of business.
• While the communciations authority's blacklist would be withheld from internet users, all 700 ISPs would have access to it, so it could easily be leaked.
• The filters would not censor content on peer-to-peer file sharing networks such as LimeWire, chat rooms, email and instant messaging;
• ISPs and the Government could be legally liable for the scheme's failures, particularly as content providers have no right to appeal against being blocked unnecessarily.

The Government is refusing to reveal details about its trials, even the names of the ISPs which have volunteered to be involved. Some will begin their six-week trials this week. All the trials will be completed by the middle of next year.

Australia's largest ISP, Telstra, and Internode have said they will not take part in the trials. The second-largest ISP, Optus, will run a scaled-back trial of just the first tier, while iiNet, the third-biggest provider, has said it will participate simply to show the Government that its scheme will not work.

The policy has attracted opposition from online consumers, lobby groups, ISPs, network administrators, some children's welfare groups, the Opposition, the Greens, NSW Young Labor and even the conservative Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, who famously tried to censor the chef Gordon Ramsay's swearing on television.

Professor Landfeldt says the censorship plan assumes websites will remain static, but as soon as the filtering system is in place many porn and other "unwanted" sites will change their designs to get around the filters, just as spammers can bypass email filters.

He said the filtering plan was "completely politicised".

The Greens Senator Scott Ludlam urged the Government to drop its "completely unhinged" policy which was "a waste of taxpayers funds". The Liberal Party's communications spokesman, Nick Minchin, said the Opposition would try to obtain the report under freedom of information laws.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/technology/web/fatal-flaws-in-website-censorship-plan-says-report/2008/12/22/1229794328860.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

[Brocke]

Google Urges Un to Set Global Internet Privacy Rules

© Guardian News & Media 2008
Published: 9/13/2007

Act now to avoid crisis of confidence, says web firm· Warning that development of net could be hampered
Google, the world's leading search engine, is calling on the United Nations to help protect the privacy of web surfers around the world before the internet faces a crisis of confidence.

The dot com company's privacy chief, Peter Fleischer, will address a conference in Strasbourg of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) today and ask for governments and businesses to agree on international privacy standards.

Mr Fleischer said the rise of the internet meant that vast amounts of information were being shipped around the globe, often to countries with no official data protection. Without a new set of rules to apply worldwide, surfers could lose confidence in the internet and hamper its development, he told the Guardian.

"Three quarters of the countries in the world have no privacy regimes at all and among those that do have laws, many of them were largely adopted before the rise of the internet," he said.

"It's said that every time you use a credit card, your details are passed through six different countries. We're talking about this to help set the framework for the internet of the future."

Mr Fleischer will address the problem at the Unesco meeting, which is focused on the ethics of working in an information-based society. The danger of failing to address privacy on a worldwide basis, he is expected to say, is that the internet's progress will be undermined by the rise in online crimes.

"A lot of data is being outsourced from Europe and the US to India, for example, but India doesn't have any privacy regulation. Europeans and Americans want to know their privacy is protected, and Indians themselves, as they come online, will also want these protections."

The company said it had already held discussions with some European privacy regulators, including those in Spain and France, and is encouraging either the United Nations or the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to take an active role in promoting global privacy standards.

Mr Fleischer said Google's aim was to improve the benchmark of regulation around the world, rather than reduce the level of privacy law in highly regulated environments such as Europe. But, he added, western officials needed to recognize the increasing importance of the internet if they were to protect their citizens properly.

Google has made several public moves with regard to its own privacy practices in recent months, including a reduction in the length of time that it keeps personal information on its customers. The shift comes as the web firm attempts to reconcile its mantra of "don't be evil" with its increasingly powerful business, and reposition itself as a champion of the ordinary internet user.

But despite such moves, the Silicon Valley company, which was started in a garage only nine years ago, has not managed to escape criticism of its own practices. Earlier this year the campaign group Privacy International said Google was "hostile to privacy" thanks to the large stores of information it holds on its users.

And just this week the company had a warning from Canadian privacy regulators over the street-level photography that it is adding to its popular mapping service.

Google Street View, which is currently only available for some American cities, is created by taking a sequence of urban photographs and then creating a virtual street-level image. Some of the pictures have included identifiable individuals, and the service has been attacked over its potential to invade personal privacy.

Canada's privacy commissioner, Jennifer Stoddart, said this week that she had written to Google over concerns that the system may be illegal in Canada. "I am concerned that, if the Street View application were deployed in Canada, it might not comply with our federal privacy legislation," she said in the letter.

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/152452.html

[Brocke]

List of banned websites in Thailand and Denmark leaked online

By Andrew Ramadge, Technology Reporter
NEWS.com.au
December 24, 2008 01:20pm

SECRET lists of websites banned in two countries have been leaked online, as the Federal Government delays a live trial of its controversial internet filtering scheme.

A list of 3863 website addresses banned in Denmark was published yesterday by a whistleblower group and is believed to contain links to illegal material including child pornography. The department of Broadband Minister Stephen Conroy has previously compared the Government's filtering plan to "successful" programs in countries including Denmark.

Earlier this week a list of 1203 websites banned in Thailand for political reasons was published by the same group. It included hundreds of YouTube videos as well as blogs, cartoons and an article in the Economist magazine banned for reasons of "lese majeste", or criticising the King.

Jerry Hutchinson of anti-filtering group Digital Liberty Coalition said leaks were one of the risks associated with maintaining lists of prohibited content. "Each blacklist is obviously rather sensitive as it gives any would-be web criminal a go-to list where they know they will be able to find illicit material," Mr Hutchinson said. "It is always possible for any information to be leaked so the Australian blacklist is just as susceptible as that of any other nation."

Under the Government's proposed internet filtering scheme, a similar list of websites maintained by the media watchdog would be blocked by internet service providers. A second tier of filtering would also remove "inappropriate" content. Customers would have the choice to opt-out of this filter. Senator Conroy's office confirmed the blacklist of website addresses is confidential for reasons of public interest, but declined to comment specifically on the overseas leak.

Live pilot trial delayed
Senator Conroy last night pushed back a live trial of internet filtering technology that had been scheduled to begin today. The announcement came as news surfaced of an Internet Industry Association report commissioned by the Howard government that found a web filter would be ineffective and easy to circumvent. "The Government is aware of technical concerns raised in the report, and that is why we are conducting a pilot to put these claims to the test," said Senator Conroy. "The pilot trial will not begin until mid-January and an announcement regarding participants will be made at that time."

The trial had been scheduled to begin today, but ISPs that had applied to take part including Optus and iiNet said they had not yet heard from the Government on the details of the tests.

On Monday Senator Conroy also revealed the tests could extend to filtering more online traffic than previously thought, including programs commonly used to share music and video files. "Technology that filters peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic does exist and it is anticipated that the effectiveness of this will be tested in the live pilot trial," Senator Conroy said.
The Opposition today slammed the scheme as "almost technically impossible".

"Prior to the election, the now Government, in opposition, made these broad-sweeping promises... to eliminate child pornography from the internet with this filter system," communications spokesman Nick Minchin said on ABC radio. "Now they've got to make good on their promise and they're finding it much more difficult in government of course than in opposition."

News.com.au has chosen not to publish details of the website blacklists, as they may contain offensive or illegal material.

Links
Digital Liberty Coalition –
http://www.dlc.asn.au
Live pilot trial FAQ –
http://www.dbcde.gov.au/communications_for_consumers/funding_programs__and__support/cyber-safety_plan/internet_service_provider_isp_filtering/isp_filtering_-_frequently_asked_questions
Fatal flaws in filtering plan, says report –
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/web/fatal-flaws-in-website-censorship-plan/2008/12/22/1229794328860.html?page=fullpage

[Brocke]

Internet filtering plan may extend to peer-to-peer traffic, says Stephen Conroy

By Andrew Ramadge, Technology Reporter
NEWS.com.au
December 22, 2008 05:52pm

THE Federal Government's controversial internet censorship scheme may extend to filter more online traffic than was first thought, Broadband Minister Stephen Conroy revealed today.

In a post on his department's blog, Senator Conroy today said technology that could filter data sent directly between computers would be tested as part of the upcoming live filtering trial. "Technology that filters peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic does exist and it is anticipated that the effectiveness of this will be tested in the live pilot trial," Senator Conroy said.

Peer-to-peer file-sharing technology is the most common way for computer users to share video, picture and music files over the internet. It was previously thought the Government's filtering plan would be restricted to traffic on the "world wide web" – the channel through which users view websites like news.com.au. Senator Conroy revealed the plan to trial peer-to-peer filtering technology in a reply to critical comments made on the Digital Economy Future Directions blog launched earlier this month.

The blog was launched to encourage public input on the future of Australia's digital economy, but has so far been saturated with comments attacking Senator Conroy over the Government's filtering plan. Senator Conroy addressed the level of critical feedback in his post and said he had been following discussion of the plan on social networking websites such as Twitter.

"I'm aware that this proposal has attracted significant debate and criticism – on this blog and at other places in the blogosphere," Senator Conroy said. "I'm following the debate at sites like Whirlpool and GetUp and on Twitter at #nocleanfeed."

The filtering scheme has made headlines around the world in the The New York Times and British newspapers and was the target of protests held in major cities across the country earlier this month.

Live pilot trial

A live trial of filtering technology is scheduled to begin this week, but internet service providers have so far been kept in the dark over the details.

Less than a week before the trial was due to begin, participating ISPs Optus and iiNet said they had not been told if their applications had been accepted. An Optus spokesperson today said the company had still not been notified of the status of its application. "We still have not received notification about whether or not our proposal has been accepted, however our proposal does not include peer-to-peer filtering," the spokesperson said.

Comment is being sought from iiNet.

'Not like China'

Despite announcing the live pilot trial would likely include filtering peer-to-peer traffic, Senator Conroy rejected accusations that the scheme was similar to internet censorship in countries such as China.

"Freedom of speech is fundamentally important in a democratic society and there was never any suggestion that the Australian Government would seek to block political content," Senator Conroy said. "In this context, claims that the Government's policy is analogous to the approach taken by countries such as Iran, China and Saudi Arabia are not justified."

Senator Conroy said the internet filter would be in-step with existing methods to censor books, films and video games. "Australian society has always accepted that there is some material which is not acceptable, particularly for children," he said. "That is why we have the National Classification Scheme for classifying films, computer games, publications and online content." "Australian ISPs are already subject to regulation that prohibits the hosting of certain material based upon the Scheme. "All the Government is now seeking to do is to examine how technology can assist in filtering internationally-hosted content."

http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,24833959-5014239,00.html

Links

Senator Conroy's blog post – http://www.dbcde.gov.au/communications_for_business/industry_development/digital_economy/future_directions_blog/topics/civil_and_confident_society_online

[Femacamper]

Sounds like Nazi Germany, not China.

[Brocke]

Mancow on the Rush debacle

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GYsT4KcxbI

[Triadtropz]

we dont want a jihad in here..

[Brocke]

Wake up Australia! This is going to be us in only a matter of months!!!


Rense Blocked In Dubai

12-7-08
 

Hi Jeff - See the screen capture attached. This is your site in Dubai.
 
It's blocked!!!
 
I note Coast-to-Coast and prisonplanet.com aren't blocked. The latter covers some of the issues you cover; such as NWO. The big difference neither of the other two will criticize Israel (or report on Zionism and its control of America and the West). Could this have something to do with it? What is going on? Have you been critical of their property boom and they don't like it?

http://www.rense.com/general84/blockedr.htm

[mr anderson]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2008/12/26/technology/AP-TEC-Australia-Internet-Filter.html

December 26, 2008

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) -- A proposed Internet filter dubbed the ''Great Aussie Firewall'' is promising to make Australia one of the strictest Internet regulators among democratic countries.

Consumers, civil-rights activists, engineers, Internet providers and politicians from opposition parties are among the critics of a mandatory Internet filter that would block at least 1,300 Web sites prohibited by the government -- mostly child pornography, excessive violence, instructions in crime or drug use and advocacy of terrorism.

Hundreds protested in state capitals earlier this month.

''This is obviously censorship,'' said Justin Pearson Smith, 29, organizer of protests in Melbourne and an officer of one of a dozen Facebook groups against the filter.

The list of prohibited sites, which the government isn't making public, is arbitrary and not subject to legal scrutiny, Smith said, leaving it to the government or lawmakers to pursue their own online agendas.

''I think the money would be better spent in investing in law enforcement and targeting producers of child porn,'' he said.

Internet providers say a filter could slow browsing speeds, and many question whether it would achieve its intended goals. Illegal material such as child pornography is often traded on peer-to-peer networks or chats, which would not be covered by the filter.

''People don't openly post child porn, the same way you can't walk into a store in Sydney and buy a machine gun,'' said Geordie Guy, spokesman for Electronic Frontiers Australia, an Internet advocacy organization. ''A filter of this nature only blocks material on public Web sites. But illicit material ... is traded on the black market, through secret channels.''

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy proposed the filter earlier this year, following up on a promise of the year-old Labor Party government to make the Internet cleaner and safer.

''This is not an argument about free speech,'' he said in an e-mail to The Associated Press. ''We have laws about the sort of material that is acceptable across all mediums and the Internet is no different. Currently, some material is banned and we are simply seeking to use technology to ensure those bans are working.''

Jim Wallace, managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby, welcomed the proposed filter as ''an important safeguard for families worried about their children inadvertently coming across this material on the Net.''

Conroy's office said a peer-to-peer filter could be considered. Most of today's filters are unable to do that, though companies are developing the technology.

The plan, which would have to be approved by Parliament, has two tiers. A mandatory filter would block sites on an existing blacklist determined by the Australian Communications Media Authority. An optional filter would block adult content.

The latter could use keywords to determine which sites to block, a technology that critics say is problematic.

''Filtering technology is not capable of realizing that when we say breasts we're talking about breast cancer, or when we type in sex we may be looking for sexual education,'' Guy said. ''The filter will accidentally block things it's not meant to block.''

A laboratory test of six filters for the Australian Communications Media Authority found they missed 3 percent to 12 percent of material they should have barred and wrongly blocked access to 1 percent to 8 percent of Web sites. The most accurate filters slowed browsing speeds up to 86 percent.

The government has invited Internet providers to participate in a live test expected to be completed by the end of June.

The country's largest Internet provider, Telstra BigPond, has declined, but others will take part. Provider iiNet signed on to prove the filter won't work. Managing director Michael Malone said he would collect data to show the government ''how stupid it is.''

The government has allocated 45 million Australian dollars ($30.7 million) for the filter, the largest part of a four-year, AU$128.5 million ($89 million) cybersafety plan, which also includes funding for investigating online child abuse, education and research.

One of the world's largest child-advocacy groups questions such an allocation of money.

''The filter may not be able to in fact protect children from the core elements of the Internet that they are actually experiencing danger in,'' said Holly Doel-Mackaway, an adviser with Save the Children. ''The filter should be one small part of an overall comprehensive program to educate children and families about using the Internet.''

Australia's proposal is less severe than controls in Egypt and Iran, where bloggers have been imprisoned; in North Korea, where there is virtually no Internet access; or in China, which has a pervasive filtering system.

Internet providers in the West have blocked content at times. In early December, several British providers blocked a Wikipedia entry about heavy metal band Scorpion. The entry included its 1976 ''Virgin Killer'' album cover, which has an image of a naked underage girl. The Internet Watch Foundation warned providers the image might be illegal.

Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom have filters, but they are voluntary.

In the United States, Pennsylvania briefly imposed requirements for service providers to block child-pornography sites, but a federal court struck down the law because the filters also blocked legitimate sites.

In Australia, a political party named the Australian Sex Party was launched last month in large part to fight the filter, which it believes could block legal pornography, sex education, abortion information and off-color language.

But ethics professor Clive Hamilton, in a column on the popular Australian Web site Crikey.com (http://www.clivehamilton.net.au/cms/media/documents/articles/crikey_19_nov_internet_filtering.pdf), scoffed at what he called ''Net libertarians,'' who believe freedom of speech is more important than limiting what children can access online.

''The Internet has dramatically changed what children can see,'' said the professor at Charles Sturt University in Canberra, noting that ''a few extra clicks of a mouse'' could open sites with photos or videos of extreme or violent sex. ''Opponents of ISP filters simply refuse to acknowledge or trivialize the extent of the social problem.''

[Brocke]

from an original post by nofakenews
http://forum.prisonplanet.com/index.php?topic=77134.0;topicseen


Internet sites could be given 'cinema-style age ratings', Culture Secretary says

Internet sites could be given cinema-style age ratings as part of a Government crackdown on offensive and harmful online activity to be launched in the New Year, the Culture Secretary says.
 
By Robert Winnett, Deputy Political Editor
Last Updated: 11:49AM GMT 27 Dec 2008

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Andy Burnham says he believes that new standards of decency need to be applied to the web. He is planning to negotiate with Barack Obama’s incoming American administration to draw up new international rules for English language websites.

The Cabinet minister describes the internet as “quite a dangerous place” and says he wants internet-service providers (ISPs) to offer parents “child-safe” web services.

Giving film-style ratings to individual websites is one of the options being considered, he confirms. When asked directly whether age ratings could be introduced, Mr Burnham replies: “Yes, that would be an option. This is an area that is really now coming into full focus.”

ISPs, such as BT, Tiscali, AOL or Sky could also be forced to offer internet services where the only websites accessible are those deemed suitable for children.

Mr Burnham also uses the interview to indicate that he will allocate money raised from the BBC’s commercial activities to fund other public-service broadcasting such as Channel Four. He effectively rules out sharing the BBC licence fee between broadcasters as others have recommended.

His plans to rein in the internet, and censor some websites, are likely to trigger a major row with online advocates who ferociously guard the freedom of the world wide web.

However, Mr Burnham said: “If you look back at the people who created the internet they talked very deliberately about creating a space that Governments couldn’t reach. I think we are having to revisit that stuff seriously now. It’s true across the board in terms of content, harmful content, and copyright. Libel is [also] an emerging issue.

“There is content that should just not be available to be viewed. That is my view. Absolutely categorical. This is not a campaign against free speech, far from it; it is simply there is a wider public interest at stake when it involves harm to other people. We have got to get better at defining where the public interest lies and being clear about it.”

Mr Burnham reveals that he is currently considering a range of new safeguards. Initially, as with copyright violations, these could be policed by internet providers. However, new laws may be threatened if the initial approach is not successful.

“I think there is definitely a case for clearer standards online,” he said. “More ability for parents to understand if their child is on a site, what standards it is operating to. What are the protections that are in place?”

He points to the success of the 9pm television watershed at protecting children. The minister also backs a new age classification system on video games to stop children buying certain products.

Mr Burnham, himself a parent of three young children, says his goal is for internet providers to offer “child-safe” web services.

“It worries me - like anybody with children,” he says. “Leaving your child for two hours completely unregulated on the internet is not something you can do. This isn’t about turning the clock back. The internet has been empowering and democratising in many ways but we haven’t yet got the stakes in the ground to help people navigate their way safely around…what can be a very, very complex and quite dangerous world.”

Mr Burnham also wants new industry-wide “take down times”. This means that if websites such as YouTube or Facebook are alerted to offensive or harmful content they will have to remove it within a specified time once it is brought to their attention.

He also says that the Government is considering changing libel laws to give people access to cheap low-cost legal recourse if they are defamed online. The legal proposals are being drawn up by the Ministry of Justice.

Mr Burnham admits that his plans may be interpreted by some as “heavy-handed” but says the new standards drive is “utterly crucial”. Mr Burnham also believes that the inauguration of Barack Obama, the President-Elect, presents an opportunity to implement the major changes necessary for the web.

“The change of administration is a big moment. We have got a real opportunity to make common cause,” he says. “The more we seek international solutions to this stuff – the UK and the US working together – the more that an international norm will set an industry norm.”

The Culture Secretary is spending the Christmas holidays at his constituency in Lancashire but is planning to take major decisions on the future of public-service broadcasting in the New Year. Channel Four is facing a £150m shortfall in its finances and is calling for extra Government help. ITV is also growing increasingly alarmed about the financial implications of meeting the public-service commitments of its licenses.

Mr Burnham says that he is prepared to offer further public assistance to broadcasters other than the BBC. However, he indicates that he does not favour “top-slicing” the licence fee. Instead, he may share the profits of the BBC Worldwide, which sells the rights to programmes such as Strictly Come Dancing to foreign broadcasters.

“I feel it is important to sustain quality content beyond the BBC,” he said. “The real priorities I have got in my mind are regional news, quality children’s content and original British children’s content, current affairs documentaries – that’s important. The thing now is to be absolutely clear on what the public wants to see beyond the BBC.

“Top-slicing the licence fee is an option that is going to have to remain on the table. I have to say it is not the option that I instinctively reach for first. I think there are other avenues to be explored.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/technologynews/3965051/Internet-sites-could-be-given-cinema-style-age-ratings-Culture-Secretary-says.html

[Femacamper]

The age ratings, while not the worst idea in the world, are far from innocent in their implications. This age rating system will give them the excuse they need to legislate thumb-scanning as mandatory for accessing the Internet / Internet 2.

[Freeski]

The age ratings, while not the worst idea in the world, are far from innocent in their implications. This age rating system will give them the excuse they need to legislate thumb-scanning as mandatory for accessing the Internet / Internet 2.

Very good point about it being just another way to glean more information about us using technology. But, make no mistake about it that the responsibility for this (personal safety and protection) lies with parents, families and individuals - and not some syndicate. At least that's the way it should be.

[liko]

Please "WRITE" & email , senator Conroy and show your disdain for web censorship.

Parliamentary office

Suite MG70
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600

Tel: 02 6277 7480
Fax: 02 6273 4154
Ministerial office

Level 4, 4 Treasury Place
Melbourne Vic 3002

Tel: 03 9650 1188
Fax: 03 9650 3251
Electorate office

Suite 1B
494 High St
Epping Vic 3076

Tel: 03 9408 0190
Fax: 03 9408 0194

email : minister@dbcde.gov.au

[Brocke]

Website age ratings 'an option'

Film-style age ratings could be applied to websites to protect children from harmful and offensive material, Culture Secretary Andy Burnham has said.

Mr Burnham said the government was looking at a number of possible new internet safeguards.

He said some content, such as clips of beheadings, was unacceptable and new standards of decency were needed.

He also plans to negotiate with the US on drawing up international rules for English language websites.

Mr Burnham, a father of three young children, believes internet service providers should offer child-friendly web access.

'Clearer signposting'

He told the BBC: "The internet is becoming a more and more pervasive entity in all our lives and yet the content standards online are not as clear as we've all been used in traditional media.

"I think we do need to have a debate now about clearer signposting and labelling online because it can be quite a confusing world, particularly for parents who are trying to ensure their children are only accessing appropriate stuff."

Mr Burnham's plans are likely to anger those who advocate the freedom of the worldwide web.

He insisted he was not trying to curb free speech, but wanted to protect the public from "unacceptable" material.

Culture Secretary Andy Burnham says websites need 'clearer labelling and sign-posting'

"It's not about banning or stopping people having that freedom of expression," he said. "It's simply about clearer signposting, more information, so people know where they're working."

John Carr, secretary of the UK Children's Charities' Coalition for Internet Safety, said other countries were looking at similar measures.

"Nobody would deny there are enormous practical problems," he told the BBC.

"There isn't a body, an obvious body, that could do this type of classification here in the UK at the moment, but it's definitely an aspiration that many governments across the world are now reaching to."

Concerns over children's safety on the internet have already led to calls from the NSPCC for computer manufacturers and retailers to install security to stop children finding violent or sexual content.

A poll carried out by the children's charity in October suggested three out of four children had been disturbed by images they had seen on the internet.

In July this year, the Commons culture, media and sport select committee criticised video-sharing website YouTube, saying it needed to do more to vet its content.

At the time, Google, the firm which owns YouTube, stressed the site had strict rules and a system that allowed users to report inappropriate content.

Prominent warnings

Diana Sutton, head of policy and public affairs at the NSPCC, told the BBC News website she welcomed Mr Burnham's suggestions, but there were issues around how they would work.

"It's one thing to have a political commitment, but it's much harder to actually enforce it," she said. "We want these ideas to have teeth.

"And these mechanisms on their own aren't enough. They've got to be combined with greater parental awareness. Most parents have no clue what their children are up to online."

She said warnings about content, such as on social networking websites, must be displayed more prominently.

"What I think is missing from these proposals is that it's not just about what sites children might see, it's about who they might meet online," she added.

A spokesman for internet service provider BT said the company would need to see the details of Mr Burnham's plan before making any further comment.

In Saturday's wide-ranging newspaper interview, Mr Burnham also suggested he would allocate money raised from the BBC's commercial activities to fund other broadcasters, such as Channel Four.

On the future of the licence fee, he said: "Top-slicing the licence fee [to fund other broadcasters] is an option that is going to have to remain on the table."

But he added: ''I have to say it is not the option that I instinctively reach for first. I think there are other avenues to be explored."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7800846.stm

[Brocke]

British MP Andy Burnham plans to work with Obama administration to establish international rules for websites

From correspondents in London
Reuters
December 27, 2008 09:35pm

    * British MP says internet must be policed
    * Wants international rules for English language sites
    * Says they could be rated like films

THE ratings used for films could be applied to websites in a bid to better police the internet and protect children from harmful and offensive material, Britain's minister for culture has said.

Andy Burnham told Britain's The Daily Telegraph newspaper the government was planning to negotiate with the administration of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama to draw up new international rules for English language websites.

"The more we seek international solutions to this stuff - the UK and the U.S. working together - the more that an international norm will set an industry norm," the newspaper reports the Culture Secretary as saying.

Giving websites film-style ratings would be one possibilty.

"This is an area that is really now coming into full focus," Mr Burnham said.

Internet service providers could also be forced to offer services where the only sites accessible are those deemed suitable for children, the paper said.


Any moves to censor the internet would go to the heart of a debate about freedom of speech on the World Wide Web.

"If you look back at the people who created the internet they talked very deliberately about creating a space that governments couldn't reach," Burnham told The Daily Telegraph. "I think we are having to revisit that stuff seriously now."

He said some content should not be available to be viewed.

"This is not a campaign against free speech, far from it; it is simply there is a wider public interest at stake when it involves harm to other people. We have got to get better at defining where the public interest lies and being clear about it."

Mr Burnham, who has three young children, pointed to the example of a 9pm television "watershed" in Britain before which certain material, like violence, cannot be broadcast, and said better controls were needed for the internet.

The minister wants new industry-wide "take down times" so that websites like YouTube or Facebook would have to remove offensive or harmful content within a specified time once it is brought to their attention.

He also said Britain was considering changing libel laws to give people access to legal help if they are defamed online.

http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,24849280-5014108,00.html

[Brocke]

Uproar?    What uproar? Except for these threads and a few alternate news sites I'm not even hearing a whisper of dissent.

[Brocke]

Protesters target Facebook after photos of breastfeeding mothers removed

From correspondents in Washington
Agence France-Presse
December 31, 2008 06:22am

FACEBOOK is under fire after removing pictures of breastfeeding mothers from members' pages.

A Facebook group entitled "Hey, Facebook, breastfeeding is not obscene!'' has already attracted nearly 85,000 members and a handful of activists held a rally outside its California headquarters over the weekend.

The organisers of the page, which is hosting a lively debate with more than 10,000 comments, said they launched their "Official Petition to Facebook'' after Facebook pulled profile pictures showing women nursing their babies.

"The pictures have been reported as 'obscene' and have been removed - their posters warned not to repost or fear being kicked off of Facebook,'' the group's organisers said.

"We're wondering: what about a baby breastfeeding is obscene? Especially in comparison to MANY other pictures posted all over Facebook that really are obscene.''

Facebook, which has more than 120 million members, said there was no ban on breastfeeding pictures but it did have a policy on how much of a woman's breast could be revealed, similar to that of US newspapers and other media outlets.

"We agree that breastfeeding is natural and beautiful and we're very glad to know that it is so important to some mothers to share this experience with others on Facebook,'' said spokesman Barry Schnitt.

"We take no action on the vast majority of breastfeeding photos because they follow the site's Terms of Use.

"Photos containing a fully exposed breast (as defined by showing the nipple or areola) do violate those Terms and may be removed.

"These policies are designed to ensure Facebook remains a safe, secure and trusted environment for all users, including the many children (over the age of 13) who use the site.

"The photos we act upon are almost exclusively brought to our attention by other users who complain."

At the weekend, the Facebook breastfeeding group staged a virtual protest online, called the Mothers International Lactation Campaign, which attracted more than 11,000 followers.

Mothers also held a "nurse-in'' outside Facebook's Palo Alto, California, headquarters the same day, the Palo Alto Daily News reported.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,24858770-23109,00.html

[lazyhorse]

Illegal material such as child pornography is often traded on peer-to-peer networks or chats, which would not be covered by the filter.
...[edit]...
Conroy's office said a peer-to-peer filter could be considered. Most of today's filters are unable to do that, though companies are developing the technology.

they're obviously planning ahead for what truthers will do after the internet goes down. peer-to-peer. look how they are already equating peer-to-peer with nasty porn.

''an important safeguard for families worried about their children inadvertently coming across this material on the Net.''
...[edit]...
''The filter may not be able to in fact protect children from the core elements of the Internet that they are actually experiencing danger in,''

whay is it families are always used as a amoke screen for dumbing everybody down to the level of a child? you'll notice they are not working to prevent children accessing the web freely, but to prevent anyone doing so. another thing, nobody "experiences danger" from photographs or words on a website, any more than they are robbed by going to see "the italian job" at the cinema, or burned by "bonfire toffee". if the child porn is distributed for free, how does stopping the distribution prevent the origional child abuse anyway? how is a child "safe" from non-sexual depictions of violence in the news?

i've never encountered child porn on the internet, and i'm sure children won't either, so if it's adult porn they're being "protected" from, might as well put a "filter" on mummy and daddy's bedroom door too, because children walk in on that all the time, and they don't drop dead. this is bogus frigid victorian morality, along with cleanliness and tidyness and the slave work ethic. you could get all of that right, and the world would still go to hell in a hand-basket, because you would have entirely missed the point, which is exactly what the evil regime wants you to do.

[mr anderson]

Uproar?    What uproar? Except for these threads and a few alternate news sites I'm not even hearing a whisper of dissent.

I'm seeing it in 'The Australian', 'Sydney Morning Herald', 'The Age'.

It's more about the filter list of 10,000 block websites than the real hidden agenda of government control.

[Freeski]

You'd think they'd be mad as hell and not taking it anymore.

[TheCaliKid]

Once again, it does not matter what the people want, they do not work for you - they work for themselves.

[Brocke]

I'm seeing it in 'The Australian', 'Sydney Morning Herald', 'The Age'.

It's more about the filter list of 10,000 block websites than the real hidden agenda of government control.

Do you think that Australians are in "an uproar"? 

[mr anderson]

Do you think that Australians are in "an uproar"? 

3,000-5,000 protesters nationwide December 13th

It's something 

[Brocke]

2008 a wasted opportunity for broadband: Minchin

Mitchell Bingemann | December 31, 2008

THE Rudd Government promised 2008 to be the year of fast broadband for all Australians but instead it will be remembered as a year of "wasted opportunity" according to shadow communications spokesperson Nick Minchin.

“Despite all the broadband hype, rhetoric and big promises from Labor when in Opposition, 2008 will be remembered as a year of wasted opportunity; a year of stagnation and uncertainty, as a direct result of the Rudd Government’s bungled handling of broadband policy,” Mr Minchin said in a statement today.

When Labor took power in the November 2007 federal election, incoming communications Minister Stephen Conroy pledged a new high speed national broadband network would begin construction in 2008.

Rather than rolling out the infrastructure needed to supply a minimum 12Mbps broadband connection for 98 per cent of the population, the process was plagued by deadline blowouts, withheld network information and a game of brinkmanship between Telstra and the Government which ultimately resulted in delays and raised questions about the viability of building the $15 billion project.

“The Rudd Labor Government enters 2009 having delivered absolutely nothing in relation to high-speed broadband, with confusion, the prospect of further lengthy delays and legal risks hanging over its troubled National Broadband Network (NBN) tender,” Mr Minchin said.

Mr Minchin also attacked Conroy over his decision to exclude Telstra from the troubled NBN tender process and warned that further delays would heighten the Commonwealth’s exposure to legal risks and compensation claims.

“The stark reality is his options have been dramatically reduced, after accepting the advice of his expert panel to exclude Telstra from the process, on very arguable grounds and despite most observers agreeing it is the best-placed company to upgrade the existing fixed-line broadband network,” Mr Minchin said.

“Considering the rapid deterioration in relations between the Rudd Government and Australia’s biggest telco, it is difficult to see how the crucial issue of network connectivity could be resolved, without potentially reckless action from a politically desperate government.”

http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24859537-15306,00.html

[Volitzar]

Cuz every one knows it'll be a Chi-Commie styled internet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxymwN7nYQQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pqxyi8iyLGE&feature=related

[Brocke]

With Gaza conflict, cyberattacks come too

Thousands of Web pages have been hit by hackers from Morocco, Lebanon, Turkey and Iran

By Robert McMillan
December 31, 2008 (IDG News Service) 

The conflict raging in Gaza between Israel and Palestine has spilled over to the Internet.

Since Saturday, thousands of Web pages have been defaced by hacking groups operating out of Morocco, Lebanon, Turkey and Iran, said Gary Warner, director of research in computer forensics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

The defacements have primarily affected small businesses and vanity Web pages hosted on Israel's .il Internet domain space. One such site was that of Israel's Galoz Electronics Ltd. On Wednesday, the hacked Web site read "RitualistaS GrouP Hacked your System!!! The world isn't insurance!!! For a better world."

Other attackers have placed more incendiary messages condemning the U.S. and Israel and adding graphic photographs of the violence. Warner said he has seen no evidence that any Israeli government site has been hit by these attacks, although they have been targeted.

On Saturday, Israel launched air strikes into Gaza in response to earlier rocket attacks from Hamas and other militant groups. The online attacks began soon thereafter, Warner said. "It really got serious on Sunday," he said. "All the stops got pulled out."

Since then, Warner estimates that about 10,000 Web pages have been hacked. Many of these intrusions have been documented on sites such as Arabic Mirror, which keeps track of hacked Web sites. Often these are mass defacements in which many pages hosted on the same server are hit.

The defacements are being carried out by loose-knit hacking groups that meet in several online forums to coordinate their attacks. One hacker, called Cold Z3ro, claims to have hacked nearly 5,000 Web pages, Warner said.

A Web defacement movement took off in the militant Muslim community in 2006, when hundreds of Danish Web sites were hacked after a Danish newspaper printed cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed. One group, which had about 70 members at the time of the Danish cartoon incident, now boasts more than 10,000 hackers, Warner said.

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9124658&source=rss_news

[Brocke]

Pirate Party Gets Massive Support in Sweden



Written by Ernesto on December 26, 2008

Things are looking really good for the Swedish Pirate Party. Running up to the 2009 European Parliament elections more than half of all Swedish men under 30 are considering voting for them. Thanks to the Internet, its membership has grown 50% during the last quarter, surpassing that of the well established Green Party.

When the Swedish Pirate Party was launched three years ago, the majority of the mainstream press viewed them with skepticism, with some simply laughing them away. Times have changed though. As the government works to introduce harsher copyright laws and others that threaten the privacy of Sweden’s citizens, the party is growing stronger and stronger.

In a recent poll, 21 percent of all Swedes indicated that they would consider voting for the Pirate Party in the upcoming European Parliament elections. Among men in the 18-29 age group, this number goes up to a massive 55% - an unprecedented statistic.

Aside from the support in this poll, more people have joined the party recently. During the last quarter the membership count increased by 50% - from 6000 to 9000 - which makes the party larger than the Green Party which currently holds 19 seats in the Swedish parliament.

Swedish Pirate Party Leader Rick Falkvinge told TorrentFreak that the Internet played a big part in the recent successes of the party. “We couldn’t have done this without the dialog infrastructure that the Net provides. Oldmedia has lost control of the discourse,” he said. With all the controversy surrounding the new anti-piracy and wiretapping legislation, the Pirate Party was often mentioned on blogs, since they are the most outspoken opponent.

For the upcoming European election, the Pirate Party requires 100,000 Swedish votes to get a seat, a goal that is within reach in the current political climate. Falkvinge is optimistic too, and said “We need to grow by another 50%, counting from the Swedish election two years ago, to get seats in the EU parliament and shake the political copyright world at its core. It’s hard, it’s supposed to be hard, but the numbers show we can do it. We can do this, and the charts are going stratospheric.”

The Internet will probably play a big role in this election for the Pirate Party, and recent history has shown that this is not only true for parties that carry “pirate” in their name. Elections to the European Parliament will be held in June 2009, and it’s going to be very interesting to see how the Pirate Party fares.

http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-party-gets-massive-support-in-sweden-081226/

[Brocke]

World of Warcraft: Teenager collapses after 24-hour gaming session

A teenager has collapsed in convulsions after playing the cult video game World of Warcraft for 24 hours in a row.
 
By Matthew Moore
Last Updated: 2:44PM GMT 18 Nov 2008

The 15-year-old is believed to have suffered an epileptic seizure after his marathon session of the fantasy game. Psychiatrists have previously warned that World of Warcraft's addictive qualities could have "serious consequences" on young people.

The boy and six friends are understood to have played Wrath of the Lich King, the new extension of the game released last week, for 24 hours straight at his house in Laholm, Sweden this weekend.

"They played all day and all night. Maybe they got a few hours of sleep. They ate a little food and breakfast at their computers," his father told a local newspaper.

After the teenager collapsed on Sunday afternoon, doctors said that his system had been weakened by lack of sleep, lack of food and over-concentration. He is expected to make a full recovery.

The boy's father says he now plans to limit his son's computer time and urged other parents to do the same.

World of Warcraft, which creates a vast interactive world for the gamer to explore, has grown into one of the most popular of all online games. More than 11 million people worldwide are registered as players.

More than 2,000 people queued for up to 18 hours outside an Oxford Street store in central London, in advance of a special midnight opening to get their hands on the second "expansion pack" for the role-playing game on Thursday.

Dr Richard Graham, a child psychiatrist at the Tavistock Centre, warned last week that some young people were damaging their social and mental development by playing the game for up to 16 hours at a time.

"The problem with World of Warcraft is the degree it can impact and create a socially withdrawn figure who may be connecting with people in the game and is largely dropping out of education, social opportunities," he said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/3477959/World-of-Warcraft-Teenager-collapses-after-24-hour-gaming-session.html

[Volitzar]

Yeah notice how the videogame industry is booming.

What's scary is how many soldiers and cops buy these things up.  It's like a NWO marketing scheme.  Whatever the NWO can do to screw up the minds of youth they pull out all the stops.

[TimeLady]

World of Warcraft: Teenager collapses after 24-hour gaming session

A teenager has collapsed in convulsions after playing the cult video game World of Warcraft for 24 hours in a row.
 
By Matthew Moore
Last Updated: 2:44PM GMT 18 Nov 2008

The 15-year-old is believed to have suffered an epileptic seizure after his marathon session of the fantasy game. Psychiatrists have previously warned that World of Warcraft's addictive qualities could have "serious consequences" on young people.

The boy and six friends are understood to have played Wrath of the Lich King, the new extension of the game released last week, for 24 hours straight at his house in Laholm, Sweden this weekend.

"They played all day and all night. Maybe they got a few hours of sleep. They ate a little food and breakfast at their computers," his father told a local newspaper.

After the teenager collapsed on Sunday afternoon, doctors said that his system had been weakened by lack of sleep, lack of food and over-concentration. He is expected to make a full recovery.

The boy's father says he now plans to limit his son's computer time and urged other parents to do the same.

World of Warcraft, which creates a vast interactive world for the gamer to explore, has grown into one of the most popular of all online games. More than 11 million people worldwide are registered as players.

More than 2,000 people queued for up to 18 hours outside an Oxford Street store in central London, in advance of a special midnight opening to get their hands on the second "expansion pack" for the role-playing game on Thursday.

Dr Richard Graham, a child psychiatrist at the Tavistock Centre, warned last week that some young people were damaging their social and mental development by playing the game for up to 16 hours at a time.

"The problem with World of Warcraft is the degree it can impact and create a socially withdrawn figure who may be connecting with people in the game and is largely dropping out of education, social opportunities," he said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/3477959/World-of-Warcraft-Teenager-collapses-after-24-hour-gaming-session.html

raid all night, raid all day

[Brocke]

Twitter hackers break into Barack Obama's account

By Andrew Ramadge, Technology Reporter
NEWS.com.au
January 06, 2009 10:45am

    * Hackers get into celebrity Twitter accounts
    * Obama and O'Reilly among the 33 victims
    * Twitter says compromised tools shut down

CONSERVATIVE political commentator Bill O'Reilly is gay and CNN personality Rick Sanchez is high on drugs, if you are to believe their Twitter accounts.

"Breaking: Bill O Riley (sic) is gay," read a post on the official Fox News Twitter account overnight, after several high-profile accounts were taken over by hackers.

US President-elect Barack Obama, Britney Spears and The Huffington Post were all hit by what Twitter described as "a very serious breach of security".

After breaking into Twitter's system, the hackers posted defamatory and offensive messages to the celebrity profiles.

"i am high on crack right now might not be coming into work today (sic)," read one such message posted to Sanchez's account.

Another on Mr Obama's account directed readers to a promotional website aimed at collecting user data including email addresses and personal information.

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone said the hackers had compromised the software that staff used to administer accounts.

"This morning we discovered 33 Twitter accounts had been 'hacked' including prominent Twitter-ers like Rick Sanchez and Barack Obama," he said.

"These accounts were compromised by an individual who hacked into some of the tools our support team uses.

"We considered this a very serious breach of security and immediately took the support tools offline."

Twitter has increasingly become a target for hacking and phishing attempts as it grows in popularity.

A report last month found that about a fifth of all Twitter users had signed up in the previous 60 days and between 5000 and 10,000 new accounts were opened every day.

Dozens of Australians have fallen prey to a phishing scam that began last week, tricking users into handing over their username and password.

The scam involves directing users to a website that looks like Twitter but is in fact part of the trap.

After gaining access to an account, the scammers send a message to the user's followers trying to direct them to the trap website as well.

Some of the scam messages have pretended to offer free gadgets such as iPhones.

"hey. i won an iphone! come see how here (sic)," read one such message, with a link to a website called "helloiphones.com".

Twitter posted advice for users on how to avoid the scam and added a message to all pages, saying: "Warning! Don't sign in to fake Twitter.com from a DM."

Related Links

Hacked profiles (warning: may be offensive) – http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/01/05/either...
Twitter's response – http://blog.twitter.com/2009/01/monday-morning-mad...
Phishing warning – http://blog.twitter.com/2009/01/gone-phishing.html


http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,24878784-5014239,00.html