In January I started this discussion about a pro-abortion site that has been blacklisted by the ACMA:

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=2464#54915

Recapping briefly, xFOADx complained about an anti-abortion site to the ACMA. The ACMA deemed it inappropriate material and added it to its blacklist. xFOADx then announced all this on Whirlpool, posting a link to the banned page and the ACMA's decision:

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1123716&p=35#r685

xFOADx later said he was attempting to show how mandatory internet filtering would stifle political speech, since adult Australian's would be banned from seeing any web page on the blacklist. As a political maneuver it was wildly successful as on seeing this senators the government was relying to support filtering have changed their mind. The odds are now against the proposal making it into law.

And that, you might think, would be the end of it. But no:

http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,25181408-15306,00.html

The web page xFOADx made his announcement on has been issued a take-down notice by the ACMA. If the site isn't fixed and the ISP hosting it doesn't remove it the ISP is libel for fines of $11,000 per day. Why? Because under existing law passed by the Howard government you are not allowed to post links to blacklisted sites on web pages hosted in Australia. Neither are you allowed to post links to links.

Which raises a conundrum. The blacklist is material inappropriate for children (MA15+ and up). I suspect the web page concerned is fine for adults. It is after all just pictures of aborted fetuses, similar to what you find in a medical textbook. However adult Australians will now find it dammed difficult to talk about it or the ACMA's ruling on it, since we can't show others what we are talking about on web forums like this. This is true even though it is perfectly legal for adults to view the web page concerned.

In the previous discussion runner said it was worth sacrificing the anti-abortion web page; I presume to protect the children. But is it worth sacrificing our ability to discuss the particulars an ACMA decision here?

Unfortunately many people get upset when faced with the reality of killing unborn babies. The truth is to much for them to face up to. They would rather we have freedom to watch pornography (perversion) despite it leading to child sexual abuse, divorce, degradation, fatherless kids. As I have sent on other posts we now call good evil and evil good. It won't be long before the earth worshipers make it illegal to preach the only message that can save mankind from their corruption. The message certainly uncovers their false morality and hypocrisy. The good news is that it will force those who know the truth to get off the fence instead of being to scared and gutless to identify with what is right.

In the context of link deletion notices, the legislation specifically uses the word "link". It doesn't define it, which is unhelpful. Given the context in which it appears a court might, or might not, construe it to be a hyper link - that is, something you can just click on. But I doubt the courts would go as far as construing it to mean any information that allows a person to reach the proscribed content. So I think it would still be possible to provide the web site address, and separate information about where to find the particular file or files within that site.

There is a right of appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT), but if the ACMA issues a link deletion notice, then it's the content service provider that has to appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, and the service provider is not usually going to be bothered, regardless of the apparent merits of the case.

The person whose website is affected has no rights in the matter. So anyone wanting to pursue this course would have to establish their own content service provider. Not that that's particularly hard - you just need a fixed IP address and a system running a web server.

On the wider topic, there's always going to be a problem with censorship in an allegedly free society, in that if you allow people access to the prohibited content so that they can discuss whether or not it should be prohibited, then you might as well not have censored in the first place.

Sylvia.

Gradually the ripples spread. The Wikipedia page on the AMCA described the incident and gave the link, so the ACMA has now banned its own Wikipedia page. Wikileaks doesn't have banned material, but does have links to other countries filter lists, so it has been banned as well.

http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/295977/australia_internet_filter_ruled_by_single_bureaucrt

The incident is gradually appearing on news sites around the world - it appeared on Slashdot today. I presume that will be banned. I expect the major news sites around the world will now pick up on the story. If they publish the link (which is after all a link legal in every country including Australia), they will be banned as well. I wonder if they banned the google cache? It contained the banned link. It is a bit hard to know of course, as the ACMA won't say.

Hey Sylvia, remember this article? http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=8369 It was about the Qantas nose dive incident off WA. The article speculated the incident was caused by a bug in the Airbus fly-by-wire software. You questioned the relevance of the article at the time, given how much time had passed since the incident.

The OLO article finished up by saying the only thing that saved the Qantas jet in the end was the height it was flying at. It speculated on what might happen it the bug struck when the aircraft was near the ground. Well it appears it did strike an aircraft flying near sea level off France over Christmas. Everybody on board died. Fortunately, it was "only" a test crew of 7 or so.

As far as I am aware, Airbus still hasn't found the bug.

Since the ACMA's list remains secret, we cannot directly know what is on it. The ACMA's own Wikipedia page now contains a link to the material, the ACMA could issue link deletion notices to anyone who includes a link to that page. If content services have received such notices, they could presumably say so, but I haven't yet seen any such claims.

I seriously doubt that the original content fits the definition of potential prohibited content. If it were classified, it would possibly achieve an MA15+ rating, but not an RC or R18+ rating. Consequently, since it consists only of text and still pictures, I do not believe it is capable of being potential prohibited content.

See

http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/bsa1992214/sch7.html

section 20, for the definition of prohibited content.

Rstuart, on the aircraft issue, I'll post something to that thread.

Sylvia

Am I reading this situation correctly? Is it now the case that by posting a link to a now-blacklisted site, in, for example, a post to a thread on OLO, that that thread (or indeed the whole OLO site) will be automatically blacklisted and filtered out?

If so, it would appear that a way has been found to shut down in its entirety that part of the internet that is interactive. All that would have to be done to black out sites like OLO, or any blog upon which comments could be left, would be for any hostile or disruptive poster to put up such links to already blacklisted sites.

Such disruption could well be orchestrated on a large scale, not so much by malicious individuals, but by governments morphing into tyrannies simply to suffocate any criticism. The blogosphere would be a prime target, as it is now becoming recognised that it is increasingly the area in which intelligent dissent can be expressed. I used the plural, governments, as a foreign government could orchestrate the posting of links on Australian fora or blogs to blacklisted sites in order that our stupid skippy filtrator would automatically black out Australian sites upon which content critical of that foreign government resided.

That would have to be Conroy's Gap!

The Myanmar (Burmese) government, for example, unhappy with something being said on OLO, becomes able to AUTOMATICALLY enlist the Australian government apparatus in blacking out the critical site. Me an' mah drover's dog done gone gunna shut youse bloggers all down!

Come on, somebody throw the first stone. Let's get rid of Steven and this skippy stupidity.

On second thoughts, can someone book him a flight on one of those Airbuses with the dicky software?

Forest Gumpp,

There's nothing automatic about it, and the only thing that the ACMA can do is to issue a link-deletion notice, that requires the individual link to be removed.

If people started posting these links on mass, and then complaining to the ACMA about their own postings, the real effect would be that the ACMA would be overwhelmed by the volume of notices they had to issue.

RStuart, I cannot extend the thread you referred to, because it has been archived. So I've started a new Forum thread, which you'll presumably see provided it gets approved.

Forrest Grumpp: "Am I reading this situation correctly?"

Nah, not really. If I posted something with an offending link all OLO would have to do is remove that post. Or just edit the post to remove the link. Or move their site to a host outside of Australia. The domain name would not change, so no one would be the wiser.

Besides, it isn't OLO at financial risk. It is the hosting service. OLO just gets a link deletion notice. If they don't comply it is their hosting service that gets fined $11,000 per day until they take the site down.

Sylvia Else: "I seriously doubt that the original content fits the definition of potential prohibited content."

I agree. But to repeat what I said when you brought this up last time, I don't think it is relevant. No judge is going to get the opportunity to decide whether it is or isn't. At $11k/day you just remove the link. Any other course of action is just silly, given you can post the link in a zillion ways on the internet that don't come under the ACMA's jurisdiction. In reality, all the only thing they are achieving here is the killing off the Australian hosting industry. Well that and making themselves, and possibly the entire country, look like morons.

As for the other thread being locked: yeah I saw that a month or two ago when I tried to post the observation I made above. Which is why I posted it here when I saw you were looking.

And now, in a utterly predicable turn of events, the entire ACMA blacklist has been leaked. It will appear on Wikileaks in due course.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2009/03/19/1237054961100.html

So if any of you interested in child porn can go and look up the complete list. A more interesting exercise would be to count how many of the 2000 odd links seem to be "harmful". Be careful though. Senator Conroy has said anybody publishing the list risks "serious criminal prosecution".

Sylvia, in regards to your not "not within the law" comment above, I notice the newspaper article says a tour operators web site ended up on the list. An apparently harmless one. There is no way for the tour operator to know they were put on the list, and these is no mechanism available to them to get themselves off it even if they did know. Which all begs the question what has the law go to do with any of this, given there can be no meaningful judicial oversight. Law without oversight isn't rule by law, it's rule by decree.

I have no problem with banning child porn links or those sites that advocate sexual violence toward women/children/men. I think we have to be careful though on how far we go.

As I have said on similar threads I would like, as a parent, to have an option to choose unfiltered or filtered internet access via my ISP if it is at all technically possible.

What some might consider banning others may think go too far. Personally the anti-abortion link should not be banned in favour of free speech and the right to put an alternative view.

What about hate sites that incite violence towards particular groups of people or that promote killing in the name of religion?

I tend to think this is inciting murder which is illegal but on the other hand we have to trust the commonsense of most people. What do others think?

Forrest Gumpp

No, there's nothing automatic about it. Posting a link to a prohibited site here would not result in the either the link or the thread being deleted or blocked by any automatic mechanism. What could happen is that the content service that runs the hardware that supports OLO (which may be OLO themselves, but probably isn't) would receive a link-deletion notice, and would then be required to remove the link - but only the link.

If Conroy were to get his way, then there would little need for link deletion notices, because any links to prohibited content wouldn't work anyway, except for the (largish?) minority who know how to get round mandatory filtering.

Sylvia.

pelican: "As I have said on similar threads I would like, as a parent, to have an option to choose unfiltered or filtered internet access via my ISP if it is at all technically possible."

And as has been pointed out in those same threads, you have been able to do precisely that for years now. For Pete's sake, if you really want a filtered feed don't just whinge about it, go and sign up for one. You can do so here: http://www.webshield.net.au/

pelican: "What some might consider banning others may think go too far."

We have a censorship scheme for movies, books and whatnot that most Australians seem to be happy enough with. The mandatory filtering proposal attempts imposed those standards on the internet in a straightforward way. So the problem isn't really with what is and isn't censored.

The real problems:

(a) The filer is easy to circumvent. So the list must be kept secret.

(b) They legislated to make it secret. Legislating to stop fire bugs has about as much chance of success. Did you know the server in Sweden the ACMA blacklist was leaked to was completely overloaded the past couple of days? Every paedophile on the planet must have a copy of it now, and a good number of Australian school boys as well.

(c) It's too expensive to rate web pages in the same way we rate movies. So one bureaucrat in Canberra makes a ruling. Because of the leak, we now know some of the sites he blacklisted:

- Betfair (legal UK betting service),
- Abby Winters (pro choice),
- Peaceful Pill (pro euthanasia),
- Queensland Dentist's website (?),
- abortiontv (anti abortion).

Odd choices, eh? Its amazing what people in power will do if the think they aren't being watched. Don't believe that? Well, the day after the list was leaked several hundred web sites disappeared from it overnight - at least 20% of its total.

Sometimes it takes a little civil disobedience to remind our pollies they were elected to implement our ideals - not theirs.

Rstuart

"I agree. But to repeat what I said when you brought this up last time, don't think it is relevant. No judge is going to get the opportunity to decide whether it is or isn't. At $11k/day you just remove the link..."

It's not either/or. You remove the link, thus avoiding the fine, and appeal against the decision to issue the notice. If you win, then you've made your legal point, and can restore the link.

Sylvia Else: "appeal against the decision to issue the notice"

There is no provision in the act for appealing the decision. From:

http://www.efa.org.au/2009/03/20/answering-a-few-questions-about-the-leaked-blacklist/

"Additions to the list are not subject to appeal, unlike censorship in other media."

That aside, you assume you know your site is on the blacklist. Let me remind you how this works:

(a) Someone takes objection to the web page, and lodges a complaint to the ACMA.

(b) If the ACMA agrees the page is objectionable, and adds it to the blacklist.

(c) The original complainant is notified of the outcome.

(d) Any filters (eg the free ones downloaded from the Government web site) are updated with the blacklist, and begin filtering the site.

It is unlikely the person who complained will appeal the decision. The owner of the web page is not notified about it. They might notice a reduction in traffic but there is no way to know if it was caused by your list being listed on the blacklist, as the list is a secret.

Rstuart, you're quoting me out of context.

There is a right of appeal against a decision to issue a link deletion notice. That right lies with the recipient of the notice.

See clause 113 of schedule 7 of the Broadcasting Services Act.

Sylvia Else: "Rstuart, you're quoting me out of context."

I miss understood what you were saying. Sorry.

Sylvia Else: "There is a right of appeal against a decision to issue a link deletion notice. That right lies with the recipient of the notice."

If that is the point you were making, then it is not particular relevant is it? I gather from reading the section you quote can appeal the grounds for issuing a link deletion notice - like whether link does really point to a page rated as prohibited content by the ACMA. But I gather from the EFA page you don't get the opportunity to appeal the ACMA's rating of the page. Is that reading wrong?

Rstuart

"I gather from reading the section you quote can appeal the grounds for issuing a link deletion notice - like whether link does really point to a page rated as prohibited content by the ACMA. But I gather from the EFA page you don't get the opportunity to appeal the ACMA's rating of the page. Is that reading wrong?"

One possible ground for appeal (or strictly speaking, seeking review of the decision) is that what is alleged to be a link is not actually a link. As I've indicated elsewhere, the word "link" isn't defined by the legislation (a rather significant deficiency), and if all that's present on the site is the URL with no hyper-link behaviour, then it may not be a "link" for the purposes of the legislation. In that case, posting a copy of the ACMA's reply to a complaint wouldn't amount to posting a link, even if the reply contained the URL.

The ACMA doesn't itself rate content - that's left to the Classification Board. But one ground for issuing a link deletion notice is that there is a "substantial likelihood" that the content would be prohibited content if it were rated by the Classification Board. So another ground for seeking review would be that the ACMA is manifestly incorrect in forming the view that there was the required substantial likelihood.

Yet another ground for seeking review would be that the content simply doesn't fit the definition of either prohibited content or potentially prohibited content. For example, the link deletion notice might have been issued on the basis the content had been given an MA15+ classification, and there's no age restricting mechanism for access. But if the content doesn't meet the test required in 20(1)(c) of schedule 7 to the act, then it would in any case not be prohibited content.

Some combination could apply. Take the abortion pictures. It's unlikely they'd be rated RC or X 18+, and neither 20(1)(c)(iii) or (v) is met. So not potential prohibited content.

Sylvia,

So you are effectively say the EFA is wrong. For now I will have to take your word for it, as I am no expert on how to interpret the law so discussing it seems rather pointless.

Right now this discussion is mostly moot as the blacklist isn't used for anything of great significance. It only becomes important if the blacklist is used as a mandatory filter. If that happens the only way we would know we can't see the abortion web page (short of circumventing the filter) is by being given what is effectively a government secret - ie being told what is on the blacklist. This very case is an excellent example. No one would have known the abortion web page was banned if xFOADx hadn't told us.

So even if the review does work as you describe, it is useless. You can't appeal a decision you don't know about.

You seem very keen on defending censorship laws. When we have had obviously appalling outcomes, such as the cartoon case or the You Tube case, or this link case, your answer is always "the law has been misapplied and if brought before a judge it would be fixed". This ignores the obvious harm that has already been done - reputations ruined, personal finances devastated, time wasted by our police and judicial system. These outcomes are a price we have to pay for censorship. They occur because we can't apply the law perfectly - even if the law itself is perfect its application will never be. Thus the harms can't be "fixed" by judicial review as you seem to imply. The question then becomes "what do we get in return for paying that price?" And your answer would be?

Rstuart

The EFA is right that there is no right of appeal for a person whose site finds its way onto the list. I didn't say otherwise. I'm merely saying that there's a right of appeal where a person is served with a link deletion notice (or indeed a content take-down notice).

I'm not defending censorship laws. I dislike them intensely. But the debate is not advanced by misinformation. Indeed, I've repeated seen claims that merely posting links that are on the prohibited list can result in $11,000 a day fines. These claims are probably leading to self censorship. It would be much better if people were posting such links all over the Australian internet, so as to overwhelm the ACMA who has the task of issuing link-deletion notices. The only downside is that because it's content service providers who have to deal with the notices, they may get upset if their users create all this extra work by posting links.

I think it's an exaggeration for you to say that my response is always that the law has been misapplied. In the Simpsons cartoon case (which I assume is what you were referring to) the law appears to have been correctly applied. That law seems rather absurd though, and it seems particularly worrying that it's possible for a person to draw a picture, and then be charged with a criminal offence for possessing it.

Yet we still need laws. The laws relating to child pornography are quite reasonable where the content involves real children suffering real harm. We want to prevent that harm, and limiting the market for such material seems a reasonable step. The problems arise when authorities start trying to apply those laws to situations to which they were never meant to apply, such as the baby swinging case, or the case where a man was filming semi-dressed children in a park. When that happens, people need to be willing to stand up for themselves, so that the authorities realise they need to pull their heads in.

Sylvia.

Sylvia Else: "I dislike them intensely."

Given your previous posts on the issue that is both surprising and pleasant to hear.

Sylvia Else: "claims merely posting links ... can result in $11,000 a day fines ... lead to self censorship."

Yes. I agree. Its a pity the minister is making them. But given he is it might be difficult to squash.

Sylvia Else: "The laws relating to child pornography are quite reasonable ..."

Are they? No one argues laws relating to harming of children aren't absolutely necessary. We have them, and as far as I can tell they are enforced world-wide pretty well. If you really wanted catch the people doing the harm, you would not ban child porn. You would do the reverse - allow it to come out into the open where law enforcement could see it and follow the trail to the perpetrators. But no, we force the trade underground, into the dark corners of the internet, making it possible for the people who produce this stuff to go about their business in relative safety.

The ban on child porn is not about eliminating harm to children. It is about people feeling such disgust at the idea of someone looking at child porn they pass laws against it. The feelings are so strong they do this despite their actions cause more harm to children than not acting at all.

We then take it to the absurd lengths of implementing filtering. Again, if the idea was to stop harm to children you would not filter. If it is possible to block child porn, then it is possible to detect it. So you don't ban the porn and instead install detectors, and hunt the stuff to its source. This would be a far more effective strategy at preventing harm to children.

But no. People like you are duped into accepting the line that to protect the children we must have censorship. If you who thinks about things pretty deeply is conned by this line, what hope have the rest of the plebs got? It's all a bit depressing.

Rstuart

"Are they? No one argues laws relating to harming of children aren't absolutely necessary. We have them, and as far as I can tell they are enforced world-wide pretty well. If you really wanted catch the people doing the harm, you would not ban child porn."

Catching the people doing the harm is not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is to reduce the harm to children. Catching people is a deterrent, for sure, but destroying the market for the product by making it undeliverable would also be effective.

Sylvia.

Sylvia Else: "but destroying the market for the product by making it undeliverable"

It would. Turning dirt into wheat would feed the starving too. However, as you full well know the filters doesn't make the product undeliverable. In fact the proposed filter will have no effect on the channels the product flows through whatsoever. Right now getting a filter that would do that seems as about as likely as turning dirt into wheat. A pipe dream.

However, putting in detectors for the stuff is not a pipe dream. In fact I read yesterday about the Queensland police building honey pots to do just that. Now if they turned possesing child porn into a misdemeanour so at least one end of the transaction didn't have a strong incentive to avoid them, they might even be able to prevent a great deal of harm. As it is the effect is likely to be small.

Much as such filth appalls me, I just can't see any real way of making it un-deliverable. There's always going to be ways around censorship and such measures, that's been shown time after time. Hunting down the perpetrators and producers seems far more effective, as long as they are suitably punished(I prefer the death sentence, no re-offending).
As for destroying the market, I wonder? It would seem that it's always been a part of the human race, from the earliest days, and if the rock-spiders can't get their fix of porn, perhaps we'd be increasing the danger of them seeking other outlets...our children?
Unfortunately, much as I'd like to, I can't offer a solution to this quandary, unless somehow someone can figure out a way of detecting and "curing" the perversion?

rstuart
Good to see you are so open-minded about this issue.

A good but well worn strategy is if your view does not match mine I will call it whingeing, that way it makes your view seem less worthy and mine by contrast becomes immune from attack or scrutiny.

While I have done something about my own internet arrangements, the same cannot be said about access for other children. My family is not an island.

You will do well to watch the Q&A episode that was on tonight. Stephen Conroy's answers might suprise you. The so called blacklist is not new and has been in force for 9 years, the dentist site that you use as a fine example of censorship gone mad was banned because of child porn spammed onto the site by the Russian mob. Things are not always as simple as they might appear. And there is not always a bad boogeyman conspiracy to censor our thoughts and freedoms.

Surprisingly you could have knocked me over with a feather but I totally agreed with Andrew Bolt's views on this issue.

People seem to be more worried about non-existent attacks on freedom of speech than on the very real dangers present to children on the net. It is becoming the populist catchcry for the sake of being a part of the 'in' crowd. But no doubt I will be accused of whingeing while rstuart's views which have never offered to even see the other point of view, will be to him, sacrosanct.

Perhaps we should wait and see what is actually offerred and what technology is available to support it.

pelican: "A good but well worn strategy is if your view does not match mine I will call it whingeing"

You commit a worse crime than not agreeing with my views, pelican. You said: "I would like ... to have an option to choose unfiltered or filtered internet access via my ISP". You now say that is not right, you already have a solution you are happy with. You actually go on to say: "the same cannot be said about access for other children". In other words your concerns aren't controlling your households access to the internet as you claimed, it is about controlling what other parents allow their children to see in their own homes.

My point was you have said this all before, so I knew what your original comment was a sugar coated lie. It is this dishonesty in debate I find tiresome.

pelican: "the dentist site ... was banned because of child porn spammed onto the site by the Russian mob."

Indeed. The dentist site didn't know of course and they rang ACMA to find out why they had been blacklisted. The ACMA refused tell them why their site was banned or even acknowledge it was banned because the list must remain a secret. So the Russian's were then able to use their site to distribute child porn for a while longer because of this blacklist. Worse, the dentist remains on the site remains on the list today, even though it has been clean for ages. Tell me, how does this slow down the distribution of child porn or protect children?

pelican: "non-existent attacks on freedom of speech"

The owners of the anti-abortion sites, Christian pro life sites and euthanasia sites that we now know are blacklisted would disagree pelican. Their sites exist only to make a political point, and they have now been blacklisted. We would not be able to see them if the mandatory filter became law. And you say the threat to freedom of speech is non-existent?