[AusNOG] Conroy censoring dissent?

[Curtis Bayne]

I suppose that's some small consolation to power users, but that doesn't address the immediate problems.

I think what is most concerning is that there's a good chance that some more radical activist groups who have been accused of quasi-terrorist activities in the past (Greenpeace comes to mind) may have their content filtered - these are the people who rely on mass awareness and media to raise awareness.

Are there any processes in place for incorrectly blocked content yet? Are the government team going to provide me with horizontal ITIL integration and escalation procedures - how can I, in all good faith, offer a minimum level of service to my customers if an external party has the ability to practically stop web content from flowing to a customer network? What if SaaS web applications are mistakenly blocked? SMEs using these applications for business workflow are going to be severely disrupted. Will the department responsible for maintaining this block list be providing an SLA? Are we allowed to pass this SLA to our customers?

What happens if an ecommerce store is blocked? This has the potential to ruin small businesses reliant on the internet for sales (especially if they have an Australian-only target market). Will these business owners be compensated for their loss of profits?

Not to mention the stigma this creates for everyday eyeball customers visiting these websites. If a customer receives a message that says "This website contains child pornography and has been blocked" then I can't see the customers of that ebusiness being overly impressed by this inference - this has the potential to actively drive sales away. I wonder if Part 2 Section 7.2 of the Defamation Act 2005 has any bearing here - I suppose it depends how good your lawyer is and whether a notice of service denial for child pornography is considered a publication as part of the act. I suppose it would be covered under Section 28.4d.

Whatever, enough lawyer for today. I think it's time for a beer.

Curt

-----Original Message-----
From: ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Sean K. Finn
Sent: Wednesday, 12 November 2008 12:58 PM
To: 'ausnog at ausnog.net'
Subject: Re: [AusNOG] Conroy censoring dissent?

I don't think they'll care all that much if you are getting around the filters, Here's why:

http://www.acma.gov.au/webwr/_assets/main/lib310554/isp-level_internet_content_filtering_trial-report.pdf

of the filters tested, they rated the probability of circumvention against each type of content filtered, so they're already aware that it WILL be worked around. Think of circumvention as collateral damage that they are prepared to accept.

'Low' circumvention probably means 'anyone with a clue and who cares'.

Yes, the members of this list are able to get around it in a thousand creative ways, but for Joe average are they really going to be bothered setting up a VPN or workaround, or just say 'stuff it, off to the pub', and commit their sins in Meatspace instead?

It's crowd control, as long as they establish filtering as 'normal' then they've won the battle, regardless of if you can get around it or not.

-Sean.

-----Original Message-----
From: ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Curtis Bayne
Sent: Wednesday, 12 November 2008 12:11 PM
To: ausnog at ausnog.net
Subject: Re: [AusNOG] Conroy censoring dissent?

If the controlling group publishes a list of blocked content then we could combine the two - why not publish a "best of the censored internet" torrent? (sans the unconscionable material, but that goes without saying)

Not only would you get your uncensored content, you'd also get a visit from two fine ladies/gentlemen in dark sunglasses and a free ride in an unmarked Police car! (Perhaps a *little* over-exaggerated, but I digress...)

Speaking of which, what will the penalties for attempted/successful censorship evasion be? How do we prove that these users are, indeed, attempting to evade the filter and it's not just a piece of spyware/an exploited machine? What about users behind corporate proxies - will it be the business' responsibility to ensure that all internal access is logged so that these attempts can be investigated?

Regards,
Curtis

-----Original Message-----
From: ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Bruce Forster
Sent: Wednesday, 12 November 2008 12:02 PM
To: Mark Newton
Cc: ausnog at ausnog.net
Subject: Re: [AusNOG] Conroy censoring dissent?


> The Technical Testing Framework asks participants to detect and log
> "Circumvention attempts".  It doesn't offer any guidance about what
> a circumvention attempt might be, however.  For instance, does employing
> the use of a protocol that the filter doesn't know about (e.g.,
> BitTorrent)
> count as a circumvention?

HAhah! Thats great so every scrape to a tracker that the bt client does
is going to be a "circumvention" pretty funny stuff...


Regards,

Bruce
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