An all-party group of MPs has recommended mandatory nanny filters for all mobile devices and data devices that can access the internet – and wants the UK’s Internet Watch Foundation secretive censor system extended to the whole world.
The All Party Parliamentary Group on Communications (Apcomms) today recommends: A global ‘notice and take-down’ regime is required, and if the IWF cannot provide it then someone else should.
The reason for given for mandatory net filters is that the default child protection settings are different on different mobile networks and different devices. This is unnecessarily confusing for parents, and so the report recommends that the industry move to a consistent, and ‘safe’, arrangement.
The Apcomms report Can we keep our hands off the net? considered the questions:
- Can we distinguish circumstances when ISPs should be forced to act to deal with some type of bad traffic? When should we insist that ISPs should not be forced into dealing with a problem, and that the solution must be found elsewhere?
- Should the Government be intervening over behavioural advertising services, either to encourage or discourage their deployment; or is this entirely a matter for individual users, ISPs and websites?
- Is there a need for new initiatives to deal with online privacy, and if so, what should be done?
- Is the current global approach to dealing with child sexual abuse images working effectively? If not, then how should it be improved?
- Who should be paying for the transmission of Internet traffic? Would it be appropriate to enshrine any of the various notions of Network Neutrality in statute?
Parliament and the Internet Conference
Based on article from computerweekly.com
In his introductory comments to the Parliament and the Internet Conference, Ed Richards seemed to think that the transition of Ofcom from a Broadcast to an Internet regulator was inevitable, as content and viewing habits moved across, albeit it raised many questions of practicality.
He also spoke of the need to protect existing players as their traditional business models crumbled, while saying that legislation was needed to break the current spectrum logjam.
Later in the conference, Derek Wyatt MP summarised the main conclusions from the apComms report Can we keep our hands off the Net? – also all to do with self-regulation rather than government interference.
The day was, however, stolen by the delegates from the childrens IGF organised by Childnet. They went straight for the difficult issues that we were all avoiding: wanting open access with safety.
They pointed out that our technology dependent, safety-first, if in doubt block it, censored feeds to schools got in the way of their supervised project work – because they could not access main stream sources, let alone any of the blogged commentaries on them. But they also wanted effective facilities to help guard against 24 by 7 on-line bullying.
