The Australian government is planning a
state website blocking systemdesigned to
prevent illegal content reaching its citizens.
There are concerns, however, that such a system could slow web
speeds in Australia and eventually be used to filter out
"alternative" content that is not necessarily illegal.
The main target for the proposed filtering system is a list of
child porn and terrorist sites, but there are concerns in Australia
that the government may come under pressure to expand the list to
cover other areas.
Despite the concerns, web security firm
Finjan supports the Australian
move.
"The game plan is for Australian ISPs to be mandated to block
access to websites containing illegal content such as child
pornography or terrorist materials," said Yuval Ben-Itzhak, Finjan
CTO.
"I would also recommend the Australian government includes in
this plan actions against ISPs and other web hosting companies that
allow
cybercriminals to host their command and control servers and
distribute malware," said Ben-Itzhak.
He cited a recent example in the US where
global spam levels dropped by as much as 75% following the
government shutdown of a US web host, which is said to have
provided the backbone for most of the world's spam.
Since that move, however, spam levels have crept back up as a
result of new spam botnets kicking in.
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