[Chapter-delegates] content filtering around the world

[Charles Mok]

The Hong Kong SAR Government conducted the phase one of a review of the
Control of Obscene and Indecent Articles Ordinance (*www.coiao.gov.hk*) in
the end of 2008 to early 2009. The further control of such materials on the
“new media” was a major part of the consultation, and also caught the
biggest share of attention from the public, as well as concerned parents.

Among the government “proposals” (despite that the authority denied that
these are actual proposals but merely information provided for
consideration) were mandatory filtering at the ISP level, age verification
using credit cards, and similar ideas which made Internet users,
journalists, human rights advocates etc all very concerned. Internet Society
Hong Kong (ISOC-HK) took on the leading role of organizing Internet users,
Internet service providers and other NGOs against measures that may become
tools of censorship by government. I and other folks at ISOC-HK attended
over 20 forums and public meetings organized by various groups including all
the official government consultation forums and relevant focus group
meetings, and other meetings organized by associations, schools,
universities, churches and youth associations.

We worked with the local IT and Internet community to unite in telling the
Government that technically such filters at the Internet service providers
level was a plain bad idea. However, the Government initially insisted that
mandatory filtering at the ISP level is a viable option, and that the
Australian government has legislated to such effect. After we conducted
detailed research and made contact with EFF Australia to find out the exact
situation down under, we had been able to rebut the government's false
claims, forcing it to at least stop misleading the public by saying that
such methods were viable and implemented in Australia. This experience has
convinced me that it is of the utmost importance for the global Internet
governance concern communities to share accurate and up-to-date information
about various issues, and be able to dispute false claims by our respective
governments with authority.

In order to back up our lobbying effort and provide sufficient background
and arguments for building public awareness, I have written extensively on
this topic (mostly in Chinese) with over 20 articles appearing in various
newspapers and magazines, and been interviewed by print, electronic and
online media numerous times on this issue. ISOC-HK also organized a number
of forums and invited the responsible government officials to join us.
Generally ISOC-HK took the role of the users in this issue, but we worked
very closely with the Internet and IT industry, including the Internet
access and online service providers.

Of course, we do not consider it sufficient to simply say no to any attempt
to control, and refuse to provide any alternative solutions. Working with
the Hong Kong Internet Service Providers Association (of which I was an
ex-chairman) and the Hong Kong Council of Social Services (the alliance of
social service organizations and NGOs here), we came up with the proposal
for “Parental Control on the Internet,” consisting of the sourcing and
development of an open-source filtering program which we hope to be provided
for free or nominal charges to any parents on a voluntary basis, with the
establishment of a sustainable body for coming up with and maintaining a
community blacklist of pornographic links, with the participation of
parents, teachers and social workers, with transparent operations and appeal
mechanisms. We are in the process of engaging the stakeholders and obtaining
the necessary financial resources for this program.

Some of the written materials on this subject in English:

ISOC-HK Response to the Review of the Control of Obscene and Indecent
Articles Ordinance – *http://www.isoc.hk/ISOC-HK-COIAO-final-response.doc*

Hong Kong's Latest ICT Initiative: Project Net Respect (Published in
Computerworld Hong Kong, April 2008): *
http://charlesmok.blogspot.com/2008/04/hong-kongs-latest-ict-initiative.html
*

An 'Obscene' Hyperlink? – *
http://charlesmok.blogspot.com/2007/05/obscene-hyperlink.html*

The HKSAR government will move on to the second phase of the consultation,
likely in August or September, and in this phase they will probably list out
one or more actual government proposals for public comment. We will have to
prepare for the worst – such that they will attempt to implement stricter
control including mandatory ISP-level filtering that was mentioned – in
light of the worrying trends of such attempts in other countries such as
Australia, Germany, China, etc.





On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 2:46 PM, Rimon Levy <Rimon at sapir.ac.il> wrote:

> Following Sivasubramanian request:
>
> In Israel, a bill proposal (declared to aim "the protection of
> children") was submitted 3 years ago, proposing to make mandatory for
> ISP to filter any content on "gambling, violence and pornography" - the
> original proposal even included the need for any user to identify
> himself biometrically as an adult every time he asked to access such
> content. After many protests, leaded by ISOC-IL, a more moderated
> version was approved on first call (to be accepted, a law in Israel must
> be pass 3 votes in the parlament), 2 years ago. The bill in its actual
> form does not mention biometrical identification, but still is opt-out
> (that means that the default for ISP is to provide filtered content).
> And the wording permits the Ministry of Communications to nominate the
> commission that will decide on filtering policy and the mechanism [Rimon
> Levy] of identifying an adult (and potentially permitting him later to
> use biometrical identification).
> ISOC-IL is making every effort to avoid the apoval of the proposed bill,
> and offering an alternative self regulation model. We hope that in the
> next month we will able to crystalise an agreement between ISPs and
> content providers that will provide a voluntary mechanism to protect
> children from offensive content without the need of government
> regulation
>
> Rimon Levy. ISOC-IL
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> ---------
> Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 12:43:50 +0530
> From: Sivasubramanian Muthusamy <isolatedn at gmail.com>
> Subject: [Chapter-delegates] content filtering around the world.
> Could Chapter-delegates write in on this thread about what is happening
> on
> the Content Filtering front in their countries with what they feel about
> similarities ( though other Governments wouldn't issue directives like
> how
> China did) of the underlying software of the China Green Dam Youth
> Escort,
> to gain a global perspective on content filtering?
>
> _______________________________________________
> Chapter-delegates mailing list
> Chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org
> http://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/chapter-delegates
>



-- 
www.charlesmok.hk
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