New Australian Blacklist Leaked Online or Was It?

Online news sites have been buzzing about a supposed blacklist that has leaked online that lists thousands of websites that will be banned by the Australian government. Wikileaks, a website that leaks documents posted a list two days ago that claims to be the new Australian blacklist.

The claim is that the new list has not been released by the government as of yet and the new list is longer to stop kids from visiting sites with online poker, internet gambling and pornography. Not only does the list contain websites of that nature but it also contains poker news sites, religious sites and YouTube videos and many more.

Under the Australian government, the Australian Communications and Media Authority decide which sites are suitable and which ones should be filtered. The Media Authority then keeps the blacklist and provides it to filtering software makers who help parents block and use the sites by using the software.

Officials from the Broadband and Communications in Australia say this is not the real blacklist. Stephen Conroy the Minister of Broadband and Communications commented that Wikileaks was ‘grossly irresponsible’ to post the list as it is not the real one.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority stated that as of last year they only had 1,370 sites on their blacklist while the newly released list has 2,395 sites on it. Officials from the filtering software providers agree with Conroy. A director from Tech 2U stated: “The list released on Wikileaks does not agree with the list which was provided to us earlier this year.”

It is also believed that the leak will only get worse as the list was sent to hundreds of Australian ISPs. Whatever the case may be, anyone in Australia found using the sites on the list or distributing the list could face criminal charges.