A technical solution to keep children safe online? This is what happened the last time Australia tried to create a ‘clean’ internet

For anyone who has been online in Australia for more than a decade, the debate surrounding current proposals to set a minimum age for social media use might induce déjà vu.

Between 2007 and 2012, the Rudd-Gillard government’s efforts to implement a “Clean Feed” internet filter sparked very similar debates.

Beset by technical problems and facing fierce opposition, the Clean Feed was eventually abandoned in favor of laws that already existed. Will the proposed ban on social media suffer a similar fate?

How to regulate cyberspace

The question of how to regulate a cyberspace occupied by both adults and children has long puzzled governments. Traditional controls on physical media are difficult to apply to online spaces, especially when so much online media comes from abroad.

As early as 1998, a report by the Australian Broadcasting Authority identified a major problem with online regulation. Namely, balancing adults’ access to legal online spaces and content with restrictions on children’s access to age-inappropriate material and a ban on illegal content.

The Clean Feed proposal sought to address parents’ concerns about age-inappropriate websites. It was first mooted by Labor in opposition in 2006 and became a campaign promise at the 2007 election.

The proposal was intended to solve the problem of foreign content. Australian authorities could already force website owners in Australia to remove illegal content, but they had no power over international sites.

To address this, the Clean Feed would require internet service providers to use a government-created filter that blocks all material rated ‘Rejected’ by the Australian Classification Board, meaning it was illegal. Labor argued the filter would protect children from “harmful and inappropriate” content, including child pornography and X-rated media. The Australian Communications and Media Authority has created a ‘blacklist’ of websites that would be blocked by the filter.

Technical problems

The Clean Feed was plagued with technical problems. Trials in 2008 found it could slow internet speeds by as much as 87%, block access to legal websites and not block all illegal content.

While the effect on speeds improved, the 2008 tests and others from 2009 revealed another problem: determined users were able to bypass the filter.

There were also fears that the blacklist would be used to block legitimate websites. Although the government insisted the filter would only target illegal content, some questioned whether this was true.

Internet providers were already required to prevent access to content that was rated ‘Denied’. This, along with the government’s unclear statements about removing age-inappropriate material, led many to believe the blacklist could be more far-reaching.

The government also intended to keep the list secret because a published list could become a guide to finding illegal material.

The blacklist

In 2009, the whistleblowing website Wikileaks published a list of sites blacklisted in Denmark. The government banned those pages from Wikileaks and in response Wikileaks published what it claimed was the Australian government’s blacklist. (The government denied that this was the actual blacklist.)

Newspapers noted that about half of the websites on the published list were not related to child pornography.

The alleged blacklist also included legal content, including Wikipedia pages, YouTube links and even the website of a Queensland dentist. This reinforced fears that the filter would block more than just illegal websites.

More debates arose about how the Rejected classification category was applied both offline and on the Internet.

In January 2010, the Australian Sex Party reported claims by porn studios that customs officials had seized material depicting female ejaculation (as a “horrible image” or form of urination) and small-breasted adult women (who appear to be underage). Many wondered whether these should be banned and whether such images would be added to the blacklist – including members of the hacker activist group Anonymous.

Operation Titstorm and the end of the Clean Feed

Although Anonymous members had already protested the Clean Feed, this new information led to a new protest called Operation Titstorm.

On February 10, 2010, activists targeted several government websites. The Australian Parliament site was offline for three days. Protesters also sent politicians and their staff mass emails about the types of pornography that would be blocked by the filter.

As Operation Titstorm gained media attention, other digital activists (such as Electronic Frontiers Australia and other members of Anonymous) criticized its illegal tactics. Many dismissed the protest as childish.

However, one participant argued that many protesters were children, who had used these methods because “kids and teenagers don’t really get the chance to express their opinions.” The protesters may have been the very people the Clean Feed was meant to protect.

The government left the Clean Feed in 2012 and used existing legislation to require internet providers to block INTERPOL’s ‘worst’ child abuse list. It remains to be seen whether the social media minimum age will similarly crumble under the weight of controversy and be made redundant by existing law.

The same, but different

The Clean Feed sought to balance adults’ rights to access legal material with protecting children from age-inappropriate content and making cyberspace safer for them. In a sense, it did this by regulating adults.

The filter limited access to the material that adults could access. Because it was government-created and mandatory, parents were also determined what content was appropriate for their children.

The current proposal to set a minimum age for social media reverses this solution by controlling which online spaces children can occupy. Like the filter, it also makes this decision on behalf of the parents.

The Clean Feed saga reveals some problems in policing the Internet. It’s also a reminder that concerns about what Australian young people can interact with online are nothing new – and unlikely to go away.