Hi Dave. Yes I’m well aware of what’s been going on in the UK. Anyone who doesn’t might like to refer to my article on the intrusions planned by the British government. This sort of thing should concern all of us, no matter where we live. If one government of a Western nation (I can’t bring myself to say “democratic nation”) gets away with it, others will be aiming to refine the blueprint. What is planned for Great Britain has already been implemented in China, which is a great recommendation!

And I thought it was only in the UK we had ministers who have no idea about IT telling the tax payers what they should or should not do on the internet. They also seem to employ lot of consultants who are getting very rich. Strange how a lot of these Govenment types end up working for the same consultants or their associated companies when they finally get kicked out.

We have a history of ‘grand IT projects’ here in the UK which never get finished, cost many multiples of the original estimates, and simply do not work as they are flawed from the start.

But I would not expect any of the companies involved to say stop, after all they are raking a lot of money in from the contracts, which seem to be specified by people who have no idea how to lock down a contract, so the poor old tax payer gets screwed for every ‘change’.

While the UK government has not yet proposed a UK Firewall they want to log every connection a person makes (obviously unaware of how web pages have multiple connections the user often is not aware of) for ‘security reasons’, and every email we send and receive (although strangely MPs are likely to be exempt), 1984 has nothing on this lot.

Keep up the fight for freedom.

Dave

Unfortunately the Letter to the Editor couldn’t contain the real meat of the argument – editors tend to cater to the lowest common nominator – hence the more comprehensive blog article.

And yes, I agree 100% that parental complacency is probably the greatest nontechnical argument against compulsory but technically inadequate filtering. As you suggest, a lot of parents are going to relax in the knowledge that the government is doing their job for them. Meanwhile, Little Tommy, who will have no trouble at all circumventing Conroy’s folly, can surf XXX sites to his heart’s content.

It is too early yet to get specific about technology, but you can be sure there will be no secrets in that regard. The majority of the ISPs are anti-filter and those companies are going to leak information like a sieve. Quite anonymously of course.

I think it’s important to appreciate that the tighter they try to screw it down the greater will be the impact on performance, and performance degradation will be the real killer in the public eye — even for those ignorant of the technology or careless of the ethics. Quoting from my article:

“It’s an inescapable fact that ease of circumvention and impact on performance are directly related. The only way to reduce performance degradation … is to reduce the security, which in turn simplifies circumvention.”

OpenDNS is a great service and the fact that it’s free removes any obstacle to its use by the general public. OpenDNS already provides very sound parental controls that are used for that very purpose by thousands of schools across the US and elsewhere, and is easily implemented in any household computer environment.

Parents concerned with their children’s online welfare, but who may be puzzled by the implementation, should get into the OpenDNS community forum and ask questions. They’ll get plenty of sympathetic help.

This is the sort of service that a government genuinely concerned with child welfare would be promoting. Not the intrusive and oppressive power trip they are currently riding.

Government intrusion, existing and planned for the future, has UK citizens in deep, deep trouble with respect to privacy and civil rights. You are already the most watched nation on the planet, bar none, and much worse is planned for you. I believe it’s an election year in the UK, so there is at least a slight chance for you to be heard if enough people can be educated to the facts.

But as I have said in the past, such things are not just a concern for Australians and Brits. All governments aspire to more and more power and other governments of the world will be taking their cue from those that get away with it.

So US, Canada, Western Europe — watch out! You are already in their sights.

> now this is in Australia does this mean that your blog may be filtered?

Well, that’s another aspect of the whole secrecy thing — nobody knows what will get you blocked. We can’t believe what we’ve been told because a lot of that has already been lies and misdirection.

I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it becomes a blockable offence (maybe even a crime) to disclose weaknesses in the system, of which there will be plenty. I know a lot of technologists are planning to go public with means to circumvent the filter. Will that land them with loss of their website, a fine or even jail time? Welcome to Red Australia!