ISPs Watchdog and Maxnet are the first to voluntarily begin filtering the Internet under the govt’s Digital Child Exploitation Filtering System.
The New Zealand govt’s Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) has apparently already managed to push live its controversial Digital Child Exploitation Filtering System. Operated in partnership with the country’s ISPs, the system is intended to focus solely on websites “offering clearly objectionable images of child sexual abuse.”
Surely all Kiwis are against child porn, but critics point out that the filter will do little to stop determined criminals and fear the list won’t be properly maintained.
Tech Liberty, a New Zealand-based group dedicated to “defending civil liberties in the digital age,” were surprised and dismayed to learn the filter was already up and running.
“We’ve made a number of Official Information Act requests to the Department of Internal Affairs and the answer has always been “in the next couple of months,” it says.
“We now have new information from the Department that says that the filter is already running and that both Watchdog (since Feb 1st) and Maxnet (since Feb 26th) are already using it.”
Worse still is that both ISPs have not informed their customers that they’re traffic is being diverted through a govt server.
All of the problem really stems from the fact that the DIA hasn’t even been charged with filtering the Internet in the first place.
“It is not appropriate for the Department of Internal Affairs to implement this without appropriate laws being passed in Parliament in accordance with the normal democratic process,” adds Tech Liberty.
Because the filter routes, or intercepts, all Internet traffic Tech Liberty also believes the system is contrary to the New Zealand Bill of Rights which requires a warrant to do so.
Also troubling is that the DIA refuses to make its blacklist public. The Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act 1993 requires that all censorship decisions must be published each month.
When it comes down to it, all people looking to access child porn have to do is switch to encrypted traffic (secure http, VPN), not to mention the other array of widely available tools on the Internet.
Plus, what’s not to prevent the DIA from adding other objectionable sites like gambling, P2P, legal porn, etc..
Stay tuned.
jared@zeropaid
