ASEAN's plan to police the Internet face problems
ASEAN's plan to police the Internet face problems
By Roberto Coloma
SINGAPORE (AFP): Plans to police the Internet in ASEAN member
states have drawn mixed reviews in the region, where attempts to
curb access or censor content could run into political opposition
and technical snags.
Information ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) agreed here last week to send regulators and
experts to Singapore within the year to discuss "appropriate
responses" to the Internet phenomenon.
Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong urged ASEAN to adopt a
"sensitive regulatory framework," coupled with industry self-
policing, to check "excesses" in the information web used by over
40 million people worldwide.
His multiracial city-state of three million people -- with
100,000 Internet users -- took the lead when it announced steps
to block out smut and license on-line forums on sensitive
religious, ethnic and political issues.
Singapore's information-technology industry quickly backed the
plan, but reactions to Internet regulation were varied across
ASEAN, which also includes Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the
Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.
The Internet is widely used to swap electronic mail, mine vast
lodes of information, conduct business or play video games. But
there is an unsavory aspect, such as child pornography and neo-
Nazi propaganda, which alarms even western countries.
"There is a limit to what we can do. My belief is for the
inculcation of correct values and discipline," Malaysia's Deputy
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said in Kuala Lumpur.
"My children are on the Internet and I trust them," added
Anwar, who said
Malaysia had no plans to institute censorship, preferring
self-regulation by the country's estimated 50,000 users.
Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad held a cyberspace
chat with Philippine President Fidel Ramos in January, further
boosting regional interest in the Internet.
"They can police Singapore, but not the entire world,
especially cyberspace," said Cecilia Quiambao, a freelance writer
and Internet "surfer" in the Philippines, where any hint of media
controls can trigger an outcry.
"The web is constantly expanding and there will always be new
sites which will be impossible to monitor," she said.
Software that blocks access to unwanted sites is widely
available, going by such names as Surf Watch, Net Nanny, Cyber
Patrol, Cyber Sitter and Cyber Sentry. These can be installed by
private users or service providers.
But Allen Lok, a manager at Singapore's Cybernet Cafe, which
offers hourly rates for use of Internet-linked computers, said
undesirable "addresses" -- the access codes to sites -- will have
to be keyed in.
Individuals and groups can thus stay one step ahead of
regulators by simply changing addresses, resulting in an endless
cat-and-mouse chase.
In Thailand, an estimated 100,000 people subscribe to the
Internet. Officials have been considering measures to curb abuses
since fake pornographic pictures, using heads of local
celebrities, appeared on computer screens.
However, Srisakdi Jamornmarn, managing director of top private
Internet provider KSC Commercial Thailand, said regulation "is
against the philosophy of the Internet," and users should observe
rules of etiquette instead.
Internet use is limited in Vietnam, where there are roughly
1,500 users and only electronic mail is available through local
providers.
People wishing further access to Internet have to dial up
outside the country, which joined ASEAN only last year and is
technologically behind the other members.
Singapore's prime minister Goh conceded that censorship
"cannot be 100 percent effective" in protecting users against
negative influences.
"But the act of censorship itself establishes what we perceive
to be right or wrong and reaffirms to both young and old the
values that we hold as a community," he said.