Australia IAA internet manifesto
p2pnet view P2P:- Australia has on the one hand a Labour government with internet censorship an important part of its platform, and on the other, some of the world’s most vocal, independent-minded citizens with freedom of speech, and freedom of online access, at the top of their agendas.
The country’s Internet Industry Association has just published its manifesto on internet policy and regulation, emails p2pnet regular Filip.
A third of the world’s population is now online and growing fast, and “the 21st Century will see the internet become a vital part of everything we do”, says the 51-page Principles for a Digital Economy.
“It will be everywhere, it will be ‘in’ many things we buy and use, and it will serve us in ways we can’t begin to imagine.”
IIA chief executive, Peter Coroneos, says the manifesto asks, “under what circumstances can the Internet in Australia be advanced or hobbled by politicians today”, stressing the organisation will be wanting responses to its recommendations from political parties.
The paper argues the speed of technological change outstrips the ability of legislation and legislators to keep up, he says, continuing, “Should or can they, regulate the internet to tackle social policy challenges arising in the wake of rapid technological change without damaging our capacity to innovate and compete?
“If laws are passed, can they be enforced?
“Is technology to blame or are we really dealing with age old human problems that neither laws nor technology can regulate?”
‘Transparency and openness’
“The internet is not a monolithic media form but an inconceivably vast and rapidly evolving series of interconnected technology platforms serving almost two billion people, involving hundreds of millions of machines, accessible and alterable in real time (increasingly by mobile devices), relying increasingly on encryption for privacy and security and recognising no jurisdiction other than cyberspace itself”, says the intro, going on >>>
It is arguably the greatest communications mechanism ever devised. But like all great innovations it threatens established business models, social practices and, here the ability to control the flow and use of information. So it presents unique policy challenges for governments around the world.
This document puts forward ideas on how some of these challenges can best be met. Just as we must innovate technologically, we must be prepared to innovate in the policy arena. This involves processes to weigh the threats and opportunities that technology brings.
Processes for development of good policy for the digital economy and the internet should be similar to processes for development of good policy throughout the economy, namely they should engender:
- transparency and openness
- proportionality and efficiency
- recognition of global best practice
- regulation only when necessary
- empowerment of individual choice through education and tools
- clarity and predictability, but with adaptability; and
- a reliance on valid and reliable evidence.
However, polices regulating the broadband internet must also factor in: the pace of change, seek conformity with international standards, manage change appropriately, aim to build trust and confidence – and above all to recognise the unique attributes of the internet that may frustrate traditional regulatory responses.
The following recommendations, both general and specific, are ventured in a constructive spirit to guide our policy makers. They derive for the most part from principles set out in the chapters which follow, which in turn stem from our analysis and insight into what makes the internet different from anything we’ve seen before.
General Recommendations
1 International benchmarking of regulation
We recommend that Government commit to a process of benchmarking our regulations and initiatives against other Western democracies in recognition of the fact the digital economy is borderless and skills and capital are increasingly mobile. Australia should aim to become a “Net friendly” destination for innovation and investment.
2 Build a strong policy research base in Australia
Evidence based policy formation implies the existence of valid and reliable evidence. As a nation we must appropriately resource the research sector, and encourage better linkages between the research community and industry, and the research community and government. The implementation of national policy priorities, while the prerogative of the government of the day, is best done when those priorities are grounded in a sound understanding of the issues and policy options by which they can be addressed.
3 Reaffirm the centrality of ICT innovation to the digital economy
The ICT Industry Innovation Council through its research has affirmed the central role of innovation. While Australia is enjoying a period of relative wealth and cohesiveness our future prosperity will be determined by maintaining sustainable productivity growth and increasing global competitiveness. Innovation will be essential to delivering the individual and collective productivity that will sustain Australia’s wealth and expansion in a diverse range of international markets. Fundamental to the innovation that drives productivity is the development and deployment of information and communication technologies. We therefore urge our political and business leaders to make it a national
priority of government and business to drive productivity improvement through the development and deployment of information and
communication technologies.
Specific Recommendations
Broadband and telecommunications policy
1. Parties should commit to bipartisan support for an open access wholesale only fibre-to-the-premises network with equivalent access for all access seekers, extended to provide ubiquitous superfast broadband access to all homes and businesses with wireless and satellite technologies.
2. This must be accompanied by regulatory reform to ensure:
- a level playing field for all access seekers
- regional parity to the greatest extent possible
- transitional arrangements to protect competitive services
- a guaranteed ability to differentiate products, and
- the incentive to invest in innovative products and services.
3. Any allocative process for spectrum should require the statement of a public benefit test to ensure that such allocation is based on national interest considerations, recognising spectrum’s role in broadband, and broadband’s role as an enabler of innovation across the economy. In addition, a number of measures are recommended to drive uptake of superfast broadband services:
4. Government should consider stimulatory measures to promote the development of localised broadband applications and services, ie. those most likely to deliver on Australian innovation, social and cultural policy objectives.
5. Government departments should be required to advance plans on how they will deliver (on the Gov 2.0 agenda for) online services to the population. The political parties must commit to advance this agenda as part of their broadband adoption strategies.
6. Teleworking must become a national priority. Government must lead by creating a policy framework for adopting pro-teleworking policies within relevant departments. Furthermore, it must commission a review to examine any consequential law reforms necessary to remove legal impediments to broad economy-wide adoption.
7. As with public funded advertising in support of the migration to digital television, Government must commit ongoing funds to educate users about the benefits of superfast broadband to encourage uptake.
eSecurity and cybercrime
1. All school based computer literacy programs should introduce training in eSecurity risks and their management.
2. Australia should work with other developed nations to foster the creation and extension of international Computer Emergency Response Teams in developing economies where they do not currently exist, to provide a streamlined international response to emerging threats at a technical level.
3. Complementing this, Australia should press for the creation or support of international agreements to foster the creation and implementation of consistent laws and streamlined protocols between law enforcement agencies to address cybercrime.
4. Domestically, we favour continued resourcing and training of traditional policing to equip forces to deal with crime as it moves online.
5. As a part of critical infrastructure protection, the overall domain name system (DNS) in Australia must be hardened in line with overseas efforts, and efforts to secure the DNS through the DNSSEC initiative adopted.
Copyright
1. For its part the IIA will continue to actively promote engagement with content owners to accelerate the development and delivery of new commercial models whereby accessible, affordable, legally available content can be provided to Australian internet users. Our Synergy roundtables are evidence of our commitment to this process. We call on Government to support our efforts to encourage traditional content owners to embrace the opportunities afforded by the digital economy.
2. Political parties must commit to reforming the Copyright Act to extend safe harbour protection beyond ISPs to pick up content hosts, universities, auction platforms, user generated content sites and other online services consistent with spirit of the AU/USA Free Trade Agreement.
3. Australia should not agree to sign on to any concluded Anti- Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) text without first allowing a full and proper public consultation and debate to occur.
4. Consistent with Recommendation 6 of the Gov 2.0 Taskforce, the IIA urges Government to commit to a policy of ensuring that, subject to the limitations identified by the Taskforce, public sector information should be open, accessible and reusable.
Cybersafety and children
1. Government should sponsor local research into online risks. In particular, it should support Australia’s participation in current international research to establish the comparative position of Australian children online vis-a-vis their counterparts in 25 other nations.
2. Government should provide a more consistent and effective approach to resourcing cyber safety education programs that rely on clear goals, theory, interactive learning or integrates with school curricula with a view to instilling behavioural change as our common goal – a safer online experience requires children themselves to exercise informed and safer choices in their online activities.
3. The proposal for the establishment of an Online Ombudsman is not favoured until it can be established that such a role will add value to online safety and avoid adding delay to current processes.
Data retention
1. Government must commit to a public debate about the merits and impacts of data retention prior to any new regulation being tabled. In the absence of broad community (and industry) support for such a proposal, a data preservation approach in respect of individual ‘targets’ underappropriate lawful authority is to be preferred.
‘Inappropriate behaviour’
On data retention, as Filip points out, “Unquestionably, large scale, deliberate, profit oriented piracy operations ought face strong legal sanctions. Criminal laws exist for this purpose”, says the IIA.
However, it emphasises, “the acts of individuals in their private homes requires a more considered approach addressing the underlying drivers of inappropriate behaviour and the capacity of any law to effectively modify such behaviour without fundamentally challenging innovation, the reasonable needs of a digital culture and the right to privacy and due process”, continuing >>>
To the extent that internet users, mainly the young, engage in infringing activities, we suggest the causes may be rooted in market failure more than they are in any regulatory shortfall. After all, Australia has some of the strongest copyright laws in the world. Until the underlying drivers are addressed, strengthening laws may struggle to arrest the problem and risk driving it underground. There are a number of dimensions to the apparent market failure.
The first is the lack of trusted and easily accessible payment systems particularly for small value transactions where the traditional methods of payments eg. credit cards are either not accessible, used with trepidation, or cannot support small value transactions. Accepted ‘micropayment’ mechanisms for specific content items have yet to evolve to the point of ubiquity.
A second is that region based licensing of sought after content make the provision of authorised content problematic. The complexities of region based licensing is one reason Australian content industries have been slow to adapt to new models such as we have seen overseas.
Legislation and litigation in our view are poor substitutes for innovation and meeting changing attitudes to consumption across entire generations. While we maintain that effective and workable copyright laws are essential, their application must be proportionate and properly targeted. To do otherwise risks generating attitudes of disrespect for the law across the emerging internet generation.
Transactional data generated by internet activity, should that be the subject of the requirement, is by its nature voluminous. Any model that extends to the facility of capturing and storing data across the entire population would require careful consideration of the scope for its misuse. The security that would be needed to surround stored data is likely to be significant; we note that relevant Australian and international standards may require extensive measures to ensure that what is accessible easily to satisfy law enforcement agency requests is not also accessible to non authorised parties.
Even if privacy and security (not to mention technical and cost) considerations, were resolvable, it is not clear how law enforcement agencies might benefit from the volume of data subject to retention — arguably without a stepwise increase in analytical and interpretive capability, increasing the volume of data to the extent envisaged could actually impact adversely on finding that information which is actually relevant to an investigation.
Stay tuned.
… and identi.ca
July, 2010
Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. It`s really easy!
Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile – http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php
Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details.
“It asks the question, under what circumstances can the Internet in Australia be advanced or hobbled by politicians today.”
The report argues that the speed of technological change outstrips the ability of legislation and legislators to keep up.
“Should or can they, regulate the internet to tackle social policy challenges arising in the wake of rapid technological change without damaging our capacity to innovate and compete?
If laws are passed, can they be enforced?
Is technology to blame or are we really dealing with age old human problems that neither laws nor technology can regulate?
These are questions implicit in this document,” Coroneos said.
The document offers a reality check to the internet policy debate by urging a return to first principles such as where Australia stands against our western counterparts. It argues we tend to over-regulated in content matters for often symbolic political reasons.
“We lack a local research base to support proposals notably in areas of cyber crime and cyber safety,” he said.
The document is the work of the Internet Industry Association. Given the diversity of IIA’s broad based membership there are necessarily a range of opinions within the member base. Consequently, the perspectives, principles and recommendations contained within do not necessarily imply the endorsement of any individual member organisation.
