Classification Act 1995 - Australia's net censorship

According to the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995, refused classification covers publications that:

 

• describe, depict, express or otherwise deal with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified; or
• describe or depict in a way that is likely to cause offence to a reasonable adult, a person who is, or appears to be, a child under 18 (whether the person is engaged in sexual activity or not); or
• promote, incite or instruct in matters of crime or violence.

The fundamental argument by the current regime, Conroy and co., is the application of the above to the notion of internet website content.

At present, the Classification Act 1995 does not include the notion of the web. It defines publications and currently this does not include web content.

The introduction of a national web filter would require change to the Classification Act 1995 to incorporate and extend the definition of 'publication' to include 'website content'.

This could have further ramifications that could well be unexpected.

All of a sudden, depending on the proposed definition of course, ALL web content could be considered a 'publication' under the law. Even your blog, your social networking stream, the comments on an online newspapers website.

Just think, www.news.com.au could be filtered from Australian's based on the comments posted by a person who doesn't even live in Australia. Four Corners on the www.abc.net.au website results in its filtering due to a story that focuses on abortion or incest. www.ninemsn.com becomes filtered due to comments left on the A Current Affair website on the topic of suicide bombers and terrorism. Really? Yes, really!

If Conroy and co. do not amend the Classification Act 1995, then it cannot be used as the reason for the filter. Simple. Careful how you tread Senator. Don't insist on change for change sake and forget the flow-on impacts of your intentions.

Sylvestor