Slashdot Mirror
Australia to Offer Widespread ISP-level Filtering
Phurge writes "According to a Sydney Morning Herald article, the Australia government has decided to take the controversial step of having internet service providers filter web content at the request of parents, in a crackdown on online bad language, pornography and child sex predators. 'The more efficient compulsory filtering of internet service providers (ISPs) was proposed in March last year by the then Labor leader, Kim Beazley. At the time, the Communications Minister, Helen Coonan, and ISPs criticised his idea as expensive. Three months later Senator Coonan announced the Government's Net Alert policy, which promised free filtering software for every home that wanted it. She also announced an ISP filtering trial to be conducted in Tasmania. That trial was scrapped. Today Mr Howard will hail the ISP filtering measure as a world first by any Government, and is expected to offer funding to help cover the cost. Parents will be able to request the ISP filter option when they sign up with an ISP. It will be compulsory to provide it. The measures will come into effect by the end of this month.'"
For every parent that picks this up so they can just plop their kids in front of the computer and ignore them all day, there's going to be one that actually uses it the right way: as a means to enforce rules that have already been set down in the house. If mom and dad say "no porn," a kid is going to try to look for some anyway. If he's blocked, he'll probably think "damn" and find something else to do, instead. If he's motivated enough to circumvent the block, then perhaps another talk with the parents is in order. Also, the filter could be useful for a lot of those instances where "accidental" porn come up, like every other Google image search.