Landmark legislation sees the Australian government committed to the novel step of child protection by banning social media for under sixteens.

  • bigschnitz@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    A few years ago the Australian government spent an enormous amount of money on a proposed firewall to protect the children. After years of development they were ready to pilot test their white elephant, and discovered that, on average, the Australian 12 year old could bypass it in ten minutes.

    It’s unlikely that the government could even enforce an obstacle as robust as the “are you 18+” checkbox that porn sites opt in to. This new law will not have any influence on under 16s online presence.

    • blind3rdeye@lemm.ee
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      5 hours ago

      I’m an Australian, and I don’t remember the ‘firewall’ that you’re talking about. Do you have a link or something to remind me?

      • bigschnitz@lemmy.world
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        1 hour ago

        This is the first result from Google. It’s I guess ancient history now being it was the labor rights push to (probably) unintentionally discredit kevin07, but internal politics aside Conroy (famous for his opposition to adult rating for videogames) was for aong time a candidate for ‘biggest piece of shit in Australian politics’. Stephen Conroy was the face of it, so search for him and firewall to your hearts content. The Alana and Madeline foundation were involved in some of the testing that damned the project, if I remember right (as if common since hadn’t already damned it with seconds of the sales pitch).