Barbara Sumner Burstyn: Internet censorship fails to tell the good from the bad

It seemed like a great idea. Install filtering software on my computer and, voila, no more spam, no unsolicited pornography, no more penis enlargement advertisements or begging letters from Africa.

The censorware promotion heralded a cleaned-up computer and the peace of mind to know that others using my system, especially children, would not be offended.

Protecting children from the cascade of bad words and images that arrive unbidden in my in-box each day, or are available at a keystroke, was the main thrust of the promotion. I must admit I was tempted.

But then I forwarded an article on the intentional targeting and killing of non-embedded journalists in Iraq to a few people.

It was a revealing piece. Not just for the scandal it exposed but because it was returned to me by a colleague. She hadn't disagreed with the article. In fact, she didn't get the chance to read it because it contained a banned word and her filtering software had made the decision for her.

Filtering software or censorware is software designed to prevent someone from sending or receiving information on the web or through email. It is becoming the must-have tool, particularly for busy parents.

But the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties organisation working to protect rights in the digital world, says that filtering software overblocks and miscategorises websites and emails. In a recent study, it found that for every web page blocked as advertised, one or more was blocked incorrectly.

Not that that stopped the passing of the Children's Internet Protection Act in the United States. The act requires all publicly funded institutions, including schools and libraries, to install censorware.

This is scary news if you see the internet as a storehouse of information, literally an extension of the library.

Even library catalogues are now on-line. So what happens when you want to look up the history of, say, the slave trade?

The word "nigger" is pivotal to that discussion but with the censorware now being installed any document containing that word is blocked.

Is this not akin to book banning? It is estimated that 45 per cent of library-users go to public libraries for internet access.

What happens to those who do so specifically seeking personal information, perhaps a teen seeking help for an abusive home situation? Type in the words "sexual abuse" and all you'll get is the blank, blocked screen.

In fact, filtering software is so unselective that, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the act not only prevents American students from obtaining a well-balanced, globally competitive education but denies them access to valuable information on subjects such as religion, sex and even political options.

But perhaps it's just a case of the US Government putting faith in a technology that is not quite ready yet. Then again, perhaps not.

While I was shocked that the recipient of my email, a well-known New Zealand researcher, would cede her personal judgment to imprecise software, the true controversy over censorware is not that some sites or emails are accidentally blocked.

The real issue is that all the most commonly used filtering software deliberately blocks sites.

Internet watchdogs are reporting that censorware packages come pre-loaded with lists of blocked sites, regardless of the content of the pages themselves.

Peacefire.org, a website monitoring internet freedoms, which is itself on the banned list of a number of censorware products, says that, for instance, a common filtering program blocked Time magazine's site because of an article critical of the software.

Another censor product blocked links to environmental groups that contained descriptions of animal testing.

The same software was also found to be blocking URLs to sites covering religious tolerance. And yet another filtering system, one that is used extensively in schools in the US, blocks anti-racists' websites, Aids groups and even the Quakers.

So while my colleague felt her reasons for subscribing to the censorware were valid - an email box full of unsolicited junk - she entirely missed the bigger picture.

Every time people subscribe to a censorware program, they inadvertently become part of the anti-free-speech movement.

Taken to its logical conclusion, censorware will irreparably damage the internet. Instead of being the frontier of information, liberal thought, dissent, discussion and free expression, it will become the sort of mouthpiece dreamed about by neo-conservative political parties.

At the least, censorware has the potential to be misused by governments. At the worst, it already is.

And as far as the argument for protecting children goes, censorware is a flimsy safety net, the lazy or absent parents' blanket answer to the complexities of parenting in today's world.

Instead of blind reliance on censorware, parents and teachers should be encouraging skills such as critical thinking and how to use technology to find information quickly and efficiently.

A child learning how to exercise personal judgment is a well-parented child, not one who is drip-fed a filtered version of real life.

The final word should go to the American Civil Liberties Union, which says censorware, like poison gas, can be highly effective when the wind is blowing the right way.

But the wind has a way of shifting and, sooner or later, it blows back upon the user. Whether you install it yourself or subscribe to a service, filtering software is toxic to a democratic society.