IN THIS ISSUE:

• Summary
• Background
• Analysis
• The Latest News
• What You Can Do Now
• Where Can I Learn More?
• Other Organisations

SUMMARY

The NSW Attorney-General is still intent in imposing his net-ignorant legislation to censor the Internet and has ignored requests from business and the Internet using public to avoid censorship. On 11 July the State and Federal Attorneys-General will consider the proposed NSW legislation as the basis for national legislation. Now is the time to contact your State and Federal Attorney-General and urge them to listen to the business community and the Internet using public.

BACKGROUND

The NSW Attorney-General has announced draft NSW Internet censorship legislation which will be considered as the basis for national legislation at the next meeting of the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General (SCAG) on 11 July. However each State is likely to implement differing versions of a national model, adding or removing parts as they see fit. It seems likely that the Net community would need to comply with the laws of the most repressive State.

Since the launch of the STOP! Campaign to stop Australian Net censorship legislation on June 9, there has been increasing opposition to the NSW proposals as the issues become more widely known. The issues have been reported in the press across the nation. Recent editorials in The Australian and The West Australian have expressed concern regarding restriction on freedom of speech and the conceptual and practical problems of the proposed laws.

It is apparent that it is not only the global nature of the Internet which is being largely ignored. So too are the difficulties for Internet Services Providers and users in being aware of and complying with laws which vary from State to State.

Despite repeated requests, an official copy of the draft legislation has still not been provided. The proposed legislation is based on the 1995 DCA Consultation Paper which in its turn was based on the 1994 BBS Task Force Report. It appears that very little, if any, of the widespread criticism of both the Paper and the Report has been taken into account in deciding whether any legislation is required, or of its content.

Whilst there are indications that contact with State Attorneys-General and their advisers is beginning to have some effect, much more is needed.

ANALYSIS

The Draft Bill is technically incompetent.

The Draft Bill errs in creating offences of transmission.

The Draft Bill criminalises innocent conduct.

The Draft Bill is unnecessary.

The Draft Bill will fail in its objectives.

The Draft Bill is unenforceable.

The Draft Bill must be rejected outright.

The NSW proposals will:

• require ISPs to "monitor material being transmitted", including private E-Mail.
• incriminate someone who has a hyptertext link to a site which is prohibited (construed as advertising).
• assign the same liability to an innocent receiver of objectionable material as its creator.
• incriminate ISPs who "make available for access" material unsuitable for minors under 15.
• subject innocent Internet users to criminal sanctions, while doing little to achieve its stated aim of protecting children.

LATEST NEWS

Meetings have already been held with the Tasmanian A-G, advisers to the Queensland A-G, and with the NSW and Tasmanian Shadow A-Gs. Meetings have been or are being set up with A-Gs in all other States and the Federal A-G.

Other organisations have supported the STOP! Campaign directly or have otherwise publicly opposed the NSW proposals (see Other Organisations below).

The following are being released today, and are available on the STOP! Campaign web site at <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>.

• The EFA analysis of the NSW proposed legislation
• A paper for A-Gs extolling PICS for parental control of the Internet
• A sample letter to an A-G
• The Australian Parental Control FAQ

There have been over 30 articles recently in the press on the Australian Internet censorship situation. These have included articles and editorials in The Australian, West Australian, Hobart Mercury, Financial Review, Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Courier Mail, The Advertiser and Business Review Weekly. Details are available on the STOP! Campaign web site at <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>.

WHAT YOU CAN DO NOW

You can:

1. Contact State and Federal Attorneys-General, Shadow AttorneysGeneral and your local Member of Parliament. Use your own words preferably or you may use or modify the suggested letter on the STOP! Campaign web page.
2. If you want to do more (particularly if you are an Internet Access Provider) visit the STOP! Campaign web site for ideas and supporting documents.
3. Let us know what you've done.
4. Watch this space for further alerts.
5. Feel good for having taken action.

Details are provided below:

1. Contact Attorneys-General and Members of Parliament
   • Contact your local Attorney-General and try to make an appointment.
   • Prepare an objection and send it to your Attorney-General. Use your own words preferably, or make use of sample letters on the campaign web site <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>. Preferably send your communication by snail mail. Othermethods of voicing your concerns are (in descending order), phone, fax, email to fax gateway. If you use a fax gateway please only send one or two pages. The gateways are provided gratis by various organisations and we should not overuse them.
   • Contact your local Member of Parliament. Lodge an objection to the legislative moves, either by personal visit or letter, phone or fax.
     
     A list of the names and contact details of all Attorneys-General together with a repository of reference material that will help provide background information and ideas is available on the STOP! Campaign page at <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>. The Campaign page also contains a link to Aldis Ozols' "How to Lobby Politicians" page.
2. If you want to do more visit the Campaign web site at <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html> for more ideas on what else you can do.
3. Let us know what you've done.
   
   After you've made contact with an Attorney-General or Member of Parliament mail a note to [email protected] to let us know you did your part. Although you will not receive a reply due to the number of anticipated responses, we'll be counting up the number of people who participated.
   
   Mail to: [email protected] using a descriptive subject line such as:
   
   Subject: "Letter/Fax sent to Attorney-General <insert State>"
   
   It is not essential to include any text in the body of the message, unless you've attended a meeting or spoken with some on the phone. In that case, please provide the date of the meeting or phone call and a summary of what you were told.
4. You can monitor the progress of the STOP! campaign by:
   • Visiting the STOP! Campaign page at <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>.
   • Joining The STOP! Campaign Alerts list to receive the latest alerts for the campaign. This will be a low volume list with no discussion.
     
     To subscribe, send E-Mail to: [email protected] with the word "subscribe" in the body of the message (no quotes).
   • Joining The STOP! Campaign [email protected] discussion list:
     
     To subscribe, send E-Mail to: [email protected] with the word "subscribe" in the body of the message (no quotes).
   • Joining the debate in the aus.org.efa newsgroup.
5. Relax! You have really done a lot to help the cause.

WHERE CAN I LEARN MORE?

Several WWW sites have information about the STOP! Campaign and proposed Net censorship legislation. Visit the STOP! Campaign web site <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>

If you need further information concerning your local situation you may contact your State STOP! Campaign Representative. Contact details are available on the campaign web site <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>.

Media representatives may contact the following:

Kim Heitman [email protected]

Danny Yee [email protected]

OTHER ORGANISATIONS

To our knowledge the following organisations or members from the following organisations have all announced their concerns about the proposed NSW Censorship Legislation. Links to these organisations web pages are provided on the web version of this alert on the STOP! Campaign web site <http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/stop.html>.

AAA World Announce Archive * Australian Council of Libraries and Information Services * Australian Computer Society * Australian Library and Information Association * AUUG (Australian group for UNIX & Open Systems) * Electronic Frontiers Australia * Electronic Frontier Foundation * Internet Industry Association of Australia * Internet Support Services * Internode * PC User Group Canberra * Public Policy Assessment Society * Queensland Council for Civil Liberties * System Administrators Guild of Australia * Voters Telecom Watch * Western Australian Internet Association

If you would like your organisation mentioned in future STOP! Campaign Action Alerts, or would like to have your organisation join the campaign and take part in formulating future releases, please send email to [email protected]

End Alert