Telstra, Optus And iPrimus Voluntarily Blocking Child Porn Websites

As part of Senator Conroy’s announcement that the government is delaying the implementation of its incredibly narrow minded internet filter, he announced that large ISPs would be voluntarily blocking child porn and child abuse websites.

Telstra, Optus and iPrimus have all agreed to block access to the list of child porn and child abuse websites on ACMA’s blacklist voluntarily. The list of blocked sites is to be maintained by ACMA, and will include URLs obtained from international agencies like the International Watch Foundation. It will not be a filter of all refused classification material like the proposed mandatory filter.

While there are some question marks over the maintaining of the lists and accountability for what sites are blacklisted, this is similar to the solution offered in other western democracies. However, it’s important to realise that in the government’s eyes, this is still just a stop-gap solution. Telstra’s press release acknowledges the fact:

Mr Quilty said Telstra understood the Government would ensure that ISPs would not be legally liable for voluntarily blocking child pornography and abuse sites as determined by ACMA and that a mandatory filtering regime would be put in place following the completion of the RC review.

It’s hard to argue against filtering know child porn and child abuse material. But it would be a lot better if this was the final solution, rather than a temporary measure.

[Fight the Filter]