Google slams Australian web filter

24 Mar 2010, 9:00 am   -   Source: AFP, SBS Staff
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Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has become the villain for many 'cleanfeed' opponents due to his support for the plan. (Getty)

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has become the villain for many 'cleanfeed' opponents due to his support for the plan. (Getty)

Both Google and Yahoo have strongly criticised the Federal Government's contested 'clean feed' plans for the internet with a long list of concerns.

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Top search engines Google and Yahoo have attacked the Federal Government's proposed internet filter, saying it goes much further than proposed filters in other Western countries, and branding it a dangerous precedent.

Google is currently at odds with China in an escalating dispute over censorship, and linked the Rudd government's internet filter to despotic regimes around the world, saying the Australian filter might "confer legitimacy upon filtering by other governments", and adding "the scope of content to be filtered is too wide".
  
Google said Australia went "well beyond" filters being considered in countries such as Britain, Canada, Denmark, Finland and Sweden, which focus only on blocking material related to child sex abuse.

Last year, the Rudd government unveiled an ambitious plan to block access to sites featuring material such as rape, drug use, bestiality and child sex abuse with an Internet-wide content filter administered by service providers.
  
Such a sweeping mandatory regime risked damage to Australia's reputation, Google said in public submissions on the plans, released yesterday.
  
"Australia is rightly regarded as a liberal democracy that balances individual liberty with social responsibility," Google said, in a submission to Australia's government.
  
"The governments of many other countries may justify, by reference to Australia, their use of filtering, their lack of disclosure about what is being filtered, and their political direction of agencies administering filtering."

Google added weight to critics who said the task is simply to cumbersome in the first place, saying the "massive undertaking" would limit network speeds, and that filtering material from popular sites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter appeared to "not be technologically possible".
  
Filtering could also give a false sense of security to parents and was easily circumvented, the company said.
  
Yahoo joins chorus of criticism

Yahoo! Australia also criticised the filter's reach as too wide and said it could block content "with a strong social, political and/or educational value" on topics such as euthanasia, graffiti, terrorism, abortion and homosexuality.
  
"Clearly some of this content is controversial and, depending on one's political beliefs, rather offensive," Yahoo! said in its submission.
  
"However, we maintain that there is enormous value in this content being available to encourage debate and inform opinion."

P2P 'loopholes'
  
It pointed to loopholes such as peer-to-peer file-sharing networks that would be "untouched" by the current proposal.
  
Microsoft expressed concerns about "arbitrary executive decision-making" and called for regular audits of blacklisted material to maintain public confidence in the system's transparency.
  
Internet user groups, the pornography industry and others have likened Australia's proposed system to official firewalls operating in repressive regimes such as China and Iran.
  
Google said Monday it would no longer filter results on China-based Google.cn and was redirecting mainland Chinese users to its site in Hong Kong - effectively closing down the mainland site.
  
It came two months after Google claimed it had been the victim of cyberattacks originating from China and warned it could leave the country, stoking tensions between Beijing and Washington.

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Lismore Liz

Marlene Hastings - from Lismore, 2 years ago

Google has certainly set the cat amongst the pigeons! WHAT PRICE FREEDOM. The next generation won't know what it (freedom) is - or will they?

What a great idea to catch paedophiles!

Chris - from Australian Gulag, 2 years ago

I'm sure that Rudd and Conroy are simply trying to legitimize paedophilia.After all, someone has to VIEW the content to be censored - they probably have to view it over and over safely in private to be sure it should be banned.Maybe the secret person in charge of the secret department in charge of the secret operations IS a paedophile who wants a paedophilic haven, like a shooting gallery for heroin addicts. Or maybe it's an elaborate trick to catch paedophiles by offering them jobs - unlikely!

Rights in a Mature? Adult? Democracy?

Bob Oort - from Georgica NSW, 2 years ago

SAM SAYS: I am not a child and I don't need the government to tell me what I can and can't look on the internet. JH SAYS: Sam... You may be an adult and can decide what you want to look at etc.). But as an adult, I am sick of all the crap that gets thrown in my face, and over which I have little control. SAM: AGREE-45, DISAGREE-3, JH: AGREE-2, DISAGREE-20. SAM's right but neither adult nor mature. JH is totally clear & mature but opposed by 20 readers (?) not adult enough to understand maturity.

No Filtering is Inconsistent

JH - from Melbourne, 2 years ago

It is ethically and morally inconsistent to exist in a society that puts all sorts of limits on "freedom" only to insist that the internet be unregulated. It is part of living in a mutually responsible and interdependent society that *some* limits need to be implemented for the benefit of all and protection of some. To those who argue that a filter won't stop child abuse - that's a nonsensical argument; drink driving laws don't stop drink driving, but we still have the laws for the good of all!

to JH from Melbourne

PB - from Brisbane, 2 years ago

If the government was only interested in blocking child sexual abuse, rape, and bestiality, then they should restrict the scope of the filter to that. Many of the objections to the filter would disappear if they did that. Instead they have chosen to block anything that is RC, which includes a far wider range of material, including much that is controversial - like graffiti, abortion, euthanasia - not to mention that fact that the list is secret and administered by the government.

Goodbye to freedom

David - from Gold Coast, 2 years ago

Let them get away with this and we will see this country become a very controlled enviroment, this is only the start of controlling the masses. I say get ridd of crudd and his Love of everything NOT Australian. He dosen't care about Australia his only agenda is to become a UN ambassador, his an ego manic.

We will protect you

Comrade Stevo - from Victoria & NSW Socialist Soviet, 2 years ago

Greetings Comrades from All Australia Socialist Soviets. We applaud the new measures of Glorious Leader Kim Ill Soo-Kev....er...Ban Ki-Kev....er....to protect our freedoms of expression. All say Wacko!!!!! We have glorious Gulag for all those who disagree and need to be re-educated in order to see Gloroious Leaders perfect plan - yours free of charge for 40 years!! Hard effort makes you free.....here, hop on this train.....

Too much time in China?

Tim - from Brissy, 2 years ago

I firmly believe Rudd has spent way too much time as a diplomat in China, clearly admiring some of their internal political policies. This will be just the tip of the iceberg as his "Minister for Information" Conroy will slowly widen the criteria for censorship. It does not really bother them that those in the know will be able to get around the filter or that it does not achieve the goal of stopping child porn, as its true goal is to control the flow of info to the masses. Knowledge is power.

Re: Peter

Angus - from Gold Coast, 2 years ago

As I understand it they are doing this under section 51(v) of the Constitution, which gives Federal parliament power over 'postal, telegraphic, telephonic, and other like services.' In a legal sense, its not very controversial; there have been greater stretches of Federal power in the past.

What astounds me

EnJaySee - from Melbourne, 2 years ago

is that armchair technicians, politicians and lobby groups are ignoring the true professionals who work with this technology every day in an effort to make themselves feel better. You don't ignore a car mechanic when he says that noise your car makes is the brakes failing and you need to buy new ones. You don't ignore a doctor when he tells you to aid in sickness recovery to take a certain pill. Why are the professionals being ignored here? This is a damned expensive tax-payer funded placebo.

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