internet filtering
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9:30AM Nick Broughall | digg_skin = 'compact'; digg_bgcolor = '#f1f8fa'; digg_url = 'http://digg.com/security/Why_The_Australian_Govt_s_Internet_Filter_Won_t_Work';
Who would have thought that here, in the dying stages of 2008, we’d be looking back fondly at the Howard government’s failed $84 million porn filter? Remember how hard we laughed when it was cracked within minutes by 16-year-old Tom Wood? And how badly it failed because the very nature of the Internet means that censorship just doesn’t work? You’d think that no government would be stupid enough to make the same mistake again, wouldn’t you? Well, it just goes to show that the government’s penchant for stupidity continues to grow unabated, now that K-Rudd and his geeky sidekick Conroy are planning on forcing mandatory ISP-level filtering of all illegal content, as well as an opt-out filter for “adult” content.
Yes, no matter how ridiculous it seems to any Internet user with even the tiniest morsel of common sense, the Government believes that the Howard porn filter didn’t work because it wasn’t mandatory for all Australians. And so now we as Australians are faced with possibly the single biggest affront to our online freedoms, while the Government decides it needs to follow up on a headline-grabbing election promise that is impossible to enforce.
While 99.9 percent of Gizmodians understand that mandatory internet filtering just can’t work, for that 0.1 percent, here’s why the filter is doomed to fail, and why you should lend your voice to the online activism movement taking the government to task over their foolhardy attempts to censor the net.
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You Have Every Right To Be Angry: The Government Wants To Kill The Internet
9:30AM Nick Broughall | digg_skin = 'compact'; digg_bgcolor = '#f1f8fa'; digg_url = 'http://digg.com/security/Why_The_Australian_Govt_s_Internet_Filter_Won_t_Work';
Who would have thought that here, in the dying stages of 2008, we’d be looking back fondly at the Howard government’s failed $84 million porn filter? Remember how hard we laughed when it was cracked within minutes by 16-year-old Tom Wood? And how badly it failed because the very nature of the Internet means that censorship just doesn’t work? You’d think that no government would be stupid enough to make the same mistake again, wouldn’t you? Well, it just goes to show that the government’s penchant for stupidity continues to grow unabated, now that K-Rudd and his geeky sidekick Conroy are planning on forcing mandatory ISP-level filtering of all illegal content, as well as an opt-out filter for “adult” content.
Yes, no matter how ridiculous it seems to any Internet user with even the tiniest morsel of common sense, the Government believes that the Howard porn filter didn’t work because it wasn’t mandatory for all Australians. And so now we as Australians are faced with possibly the single biggest affront to our online freedoms, while the Government decides it needs to follow up on a headline-grabbing election promise that is impossible to enforce.
While 99.9 percent of Gizmodians understand that mandatory internet filtering just can’t work, for that 0.1 percent, here’s why the filter is doomed to fail, and why you should lend your voice to the online activism movement taking the government to task over their foolhardy attempts to censor the net.
More » 
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