A Liberal National government in Australia would adopt the opt-out UK approach to filtering for all Australians. The policy comes less than 41 hours before polls open for voting in the federal election where the Coalition is currently expected to win. It is also almost a year after the Labour government abandoned its plans for mandatory Internet filtering, and three years after the Coalition announced that it would not support a policy for mandatory Internet filtering. The announcement, buried in an AU$10 million Internet safety policy published on-line today announces that under a Tony Abbott government, Australians would have “adult content” filters installed on their phone services and fixed Internet services unless they opt out.
“The Coalition will work with service providers (which provide fixed-line broadband services to the home) to develop on-line safety standards for those services, recognizing that they are very often accessed by children. “As has recently been achieved in the UK, we expect these standards will involve the major service providers providing home network filters for all new home broadband services, which will be switched on as the default unless the customer specifies otherwise.”
This is an example of doublespeak and backing down on promises. The Liberal government will not implement a useful plan for an NBN; they only want to filter the Internet and restrict online freedom.
That is the sign of a government in denial, they are merely signing on the dotted line to suit other interests and they do not care what the people think about the Internet filter. They say that this is to block online pornographic material, but that is how it begins. Then they will be blocking websites that are critical of the government and cracking down on free speech. Just like in North Korea and China. They have filtered Internet and it has not done them any good. North Korea have managed to construct their own tablet computer the Samijon, but this surprisingly does not include access to the Internet. Of course no one in Korea can afford that anyway with all of the famines and destitute conditions in that country. But this is a sign that even the worst country can produce technology. They have no freedom; but they have a tablet to play games on. Here is an article about this tablet computer: http://www.geekosystem.com/north-korea-samjiyon/. The Internet in North Korea is more like an Intranet; this allows the users to browse some websites; but not to access the wider world wide web that we all enjoy. All of the computers seem to run Internet Explorer and Windows, that is shocking enough; no Macintosh or Linux/UNIX computers anywhere. And they seem to be using very basic HTML pages. No flash HTML5 interfaces anywhere. The only content allowed is government propaganda. Article: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/inside-the-pocket-sized-dystopian-internet-of-north-korea–2. That is what our Internet is Australia could be with the Internet filter and other government controls put in place.
The Liberal party has said that this is an opt-out filter; but this flies in the face of the facts that this is not a new option and it has been floating around for a long time. This will come to pass one way or another.