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Australia Says No To Spyware
PrivateDonut writes "Australian parliament introduced a bill on Thursday that would 'make it illegal for anyone to install a program without informed approval and attract a fine of $10,000.' Is this doomed to fail as many other anti-spam/spyware bills have failed? Or has Australia finally hit the mark?"
If this were in the US, 'informed' would mean "Well, he was getting great offers..so in effect..we're practically putting money in his pocket!"
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
OK, I relaise that very few people understand Australian Parliamentary procedure (including whoever posted this)
This is a Private Senator's Bill which means it is going no-where in our system.
Even more irrelevant is it's introduction by the Australian Democrats, a fringe party in the process of disapearing completely.
(proving that having progressive ideas about computers is no guarantor of electoral success)
Very, very rarely a Government will look at a Private Bill, say "hey that's a good idea" and then re-introduce it as a Government Bill (yes, about three years ago a PMB was passed into law but it was notable for being an exception).
That's the day for headline stories on Slashdot.
Even if the proposals in the Bill are workable (enough spyware is made by companies operating in Australia to have some enforceable merit) the Bill itself is not likely to become Law.
'There is a Light that never goes out.'
People seem to assume that laws should only be enacted if they can "perfectly" prevent what is made illegal. People then seem to say a law that doesn't perfectly prevent the act that is made illegal is a waste of time.
Laws don't work that way.
Prevention of "illegal acts" is actually an intended side effect of the law. Murder, for example, is commonly prevented because of the consequences of the laws against murder, not purely because of the existance of the law itself. The significant punishment for murder hopefully makes people think twice about committing it. Of course, people sometimes still commit murder, irrespective of the law against it. Murder could be declared illegal, with no punishment attached. Law abiding people should therefore not commit it, however the significant punishment attached is what gives the law it's "teeth".
Laws primary goal is to create a significant level of discouragment to commit the illegal act. In most cases, that discouragement then has a resultant effect of preventing most cases occuring. Laws are actually a form of behaviour control.
Laws such as this one are an attempt to make spyware authors think twice about creating it. It certainly won't perfectly eliminate it. However, if there is a significant reduction in spyware, then the law can be considered to be effective.
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf