Filtering The World Wide Web
China is in the news because of the “Green Dam-Youth Escort” software which was developed by two government-linked Chinese companies to help parents keep children from seeing pornography on the Internet. The Chinese government sent notice to all PC makers to include the software with all PCs sold in China starting July 1, 2009. As the plan of filtering the world wide web reached Chinese users, some contributors to online forums described it as a noble effort, but many voiced other concerns.
First and foremost of all concerns is the question of “Who is going to decide and make judgment about which Web sites are ‘bad’?”. Others worry that the program could be used to collect private user data — and this is technically possible. “It’s already hard to have privacy on the Internet and this could make things worse.” is another comment made on the move of China to have the filtering software installed on every PC that will be sold to its citizens by next month.
Many of us are unaware but there is also such a kind of move in our legislature. In the guise of preventing child pornography, punishing the perpetrators of the despicable crime and protecting the child online, Senate Bill 2317 has in its Section 8 a provision that says “All Internet Service Providers (ISPs) shall install available technology, program or software to ensure that access to or transmittal of Child Pornography will be blocked or filtered.”
Lest I be misunderstood of being against the proposed Child Anti-Pornography Act of 2008, let me categorically state that I am NOT against it. My blog post on Porno Surfing at Cafés will bear me on this. It is only the provision in Section 8 that I quoted above which must raise concern on anybody using the Internet. If China which is known for its strict laws and regulations only wants anti-pornography filtering software to be installed in every computer that will be sold in its country, why will a democratic country like the Philippines impose such filtering at the level of the Internet Service Providers. Imagine the threat of such move to every Filipino’s freedom of choice and possible invasion of his privacy.
By the way, let me also say that filtering pornographic sites is not new to café owners. There are already many local ordinances mandating computer rental shops to block pornographic sites and many other internet café owners are voluntarily doing it. The issue I am driving at is should the filtering be done by the ISPs? Let us hear your opinions about this issue. This is a concern of everyone using the world wide web.
NOTE: Your comments are welcome here but you may wish to proceed to Café Forum for your questions and comments.
That one is totally absurd…. The bandwidth capping has already caused much trouble regarding privacy.. now filtering websites… I believe China wants the software to be installed so they can control what their people are viewing (remember the block on wordpress, etc.. that happened on China recently)..
If the government will pursue net filtering on ISP level, who can guarantee that only child porn websites will be blocked?
We could expect an uproar from net users if this happens.
Thank you for the comment. Senate Bill 2317 is already approved and waiting for the counterpart bill from Congress. The absurd provision on web filtering at ISP level is in there so unless the bicameral committee deletes the provision, it will become part of the law.
If something must be done to protest such provision in the bill, it must be done now before it reaches the last step to becoming a law.
this is a very ignorant proposal… it just shows that the person who crafted this bill doesn’t have any idea how internet works…. its a total invasion of privacy, coz though their intentions are good the way to do this is actually not a very good idea….
in order for the ISP to know the traffic of a particular network it needs to deploy monitoring software which is once again against the privacy right of the Filipino people….
again… though their intentions are good but their means are in no way possible and acceptable to the general public….
A crime done in private is a public act, privacy or privacy law cannot be uses to protect criminals
For the best interest of the Child, the internet should be filtered by a Interpol
this is a provision made by people ignorant of technology. perhaps, should i say, they are not ignorant, but opportunistic?
computerization of our elections is inevitable, and would most likely utilize the internet for data transfers. placing a filtering software between the data paths is the best way to hide their scripts for cheating the vote count.
am i paranoid? perhaps. but the future of the country is at stake here.
is blocking child pornography possible? not by a long shot. those claiming it is, are full of it. if you can place a wall in front of it, they can avoid it. it’s that simple!
so they ask, what should they do instead? well, i would again, simply answer, “Enforce the existing laws, dummies!” Foreigners have been caught in pedophilia acts in many incidents ( as the case of the Australian WHO director, no less). what does our government do? Deport him! Since when did it become law to automatically deport pedophiles? they should be incarcerated in Philippine jails (which is far worse than any 1st world country jail). they did the crime here, therefore, they should pay for it here. throw away the key for all i care… you’re a pedophile and should be removed from the general public.
there are enough laws to protect our children. the problem is, they don’t want to implement them. our present law makers are just making redundant motions that does not do anyone any good, but their own personal agendas.
oh, and please leave the internet connection alone for crying out loud. our isp is having enough problems trying to provide us with a reliable connection. don’t add to their problem, and ours.
Congressman, are you listening?
Even United States, who has a great advocacy on Child protection, can’t stop child pornography.
I hope congress can make a difference…
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someone can always use proxy bypasser para maka surf sa mga blacklisted na sites. ive tried it, ang daming pwede gamitin! meron talaga paraan kahit papano.