Cracker Defiles
Aussie Authority
by Stewart
Taggart
8:30 a.m. 10.Dec.1999 PST
SYDNEY, Australia -- For almost half a day,
the censor itself was censored. After a cracker defaced and
placed obscenities on the homepage of the Australian
Broadcasting Authority (ABA) early Friday morning, the
regulatory agency was forced to take its Web site offline.
"We're investigating, and awaiting a
report from our ISP," said ABA spokeswoman Anne Hewer.
The vandalism was done as a protest against
the nation's controversial new online censorship laws, which
go into effect 1 January. The ABA
is the government agency responsible for regulating and
licensing the nation's broadcasting industry and is required
to uphold the new law.
The Web site crack appears to have occurred
sometime in the early hours of Friday morning. In a rambling,
jumbled diatribe placed at the bottom of the homepage, the
hacker -- identified only as "Ned R." -- taunted the
organization. The site remained offline for most of the day
Friday, but has since been reactivated.
"You can't [^%$#($^] censor me,"
the cracker wrote. "If a message wants to get out, it
will."
"People only now can get connectivity
the USA has enjoyed for years. And now one of the greatest
resources we gave for free speech and free learning will be
stifled by a vocal minority with no understanding of the
underlying technology."
The message ended with the cracker
apologizing for his various typos and bad spelling because
"I was high on methyldioxymethamphetamines and
crack."
Passed by Australia's legislature 30 June,
Australia's new online content laws institute a
complaint-driven system of Internet content regulation that
ultimately empowers the ABA to legally force content providers
to take down material from Web servers located in Australia.
After the ABA investigates a complaint about
the content on any Web site regardless of location, it can
request that the nation's classification authority for books
and movies rate the content. If the content is deemed
excessively sexually explicit, violent, or offensive, it can
be ordered to be taken down if it is hosted in Australia. ISPs
will be required to offer subscribers home filtering software
that can block access to similarly offensive sites that are
located outside Australia.
Free speech advocates have opposed the new
law as at best, unworkable and at worst, part of a trend
toward circumscribing citizens' rights to think independently.
For its part, the Australian government acknowledges the law
isn't perfect, but stresses something must be done to protect
children against the Internet's more unsavory corners.
Ms. Hewer said the ABA has outsourced
technical management of its Web site to a commercial ISP,
which it has used for about the last 18 months. She said this
morning's attack was the second substantive disruption to the
site in recent months by opponents of the new online content
law, but that the previous attack didn't force the ABA to take
its Web site offline.
"Last time we didn't shut down the
site, but just altered the page," she said. "This
time we shut the site down for security reasons."
Related Links:
ABC
Site Falls to Crackers
