It looks like our protest over the Rudd and now Gillard governments plans for a mandatory Internet filter have had at least some effect. News this week is that Julia has put the filter off until at least next year for more “consultation”.

Julia say “understands concerns about the Government’s controversial mandatory internet filtering policy, but Communications Minister Stephen Conroy was putting effort in to get the policy into shape.”

I’m not sure how the policy can be put into shape. My suggestion is to turn it into confetti. How will 12 months of  faux-consultation provide an outcome which is acceptable to anyone with a little tech-savy.

So what’s so wrong with a centralized filter. First off, it’s open to abuse. Abuse but the government, and/or abuse by the managing  public “servants”.  The second point is, they don’t work.  Any pedo with an ounce of tech skills with by-pass the filter using an encrypted proxy service which will not trigger any filter due to the encryption. If the government plans to break these encrypted connections and inspect the contents, what about our banking information? They use encrypted connections too. How do you differentiate between the two types of information. Will they care?

So what do I do to protect my family from unwanted information on the Internet?

It’s simple, I use OpenDNS (www.opendns.com), a free service which bypasses the DNS service of my ISP. The OpenDNS service inspects all traffic from my connection and if an Internet page is requested which I have determined is not wanted, either by a catagory or a specific site, an error message is returned and there is no way to get around it.

It took just 1 hour to setup and configure. No software is required, just a simple change to your computer configuration which is entirely document on the site.

If you would like further information, visit www.opendns.com or make contact we me an I’ll give you a run through.

Remember, delayed is not cancelled!! Please keep up the questioning until they denounce it or get thrown out of government. My preference is the second option but you need to make up your own mind.