Optus today announced it will support a voluntary industry approach aimed at preventing access to child abuse and child pornography material on the internet. Optus and other major ISPs will work together to develop a voluntary code designed to ensure access to URLs which relate to the sexual exploitation of children are blocked.

Maha Krishnapillai, Optus Director of Government and Corporate Affairs said:

"As a responsible ISP, Optus has long supported the view that we should do whatever we can to make the internet as open as possible but without putting at risk the most vulnerable section of our society, children. We believe that the voluntary industry approach announced today, which aims to block access to child abuse and child pornography content, is a constructive step towards furthering this objective. This is about blocking the worst of the worst sites on the internet which is something we have long supported.

"Over the coming months we will work with other members of the internet industry and Government to implement this approach which we believe will have broad industry support. We will develop a voluntary code to focus on blocking child abuse and child pornography material which will bring Australia into line with the voluntary filtering schemes being successfully implemented by ISPs in the UK, other parts of Europe and Canada.

"We believe it is essential to the success of this approach that the list of child abuse and child pornography sites for filtering has adequate safeguards and governance to ensure its integrity. Indeed we welcome today's announcement of the improved accountability and transparency measures by the Government and its recommendation of a review of the Refused Classification category to ensure it reflects current community standards.

"There is no silver bullet solution to prevent criminal behaviour on the internet. However, we believe there are a number of measures which will go some way to making the internet a safer place, including the voluntary approach announced today; increased policing to eradicate criminal activity conducted online; a strong role for Government in promoting and providing information and education to the community on safer internet usage; and most importantly ensuring appropriate security software is installed on devices we use to connect to the internet.

"We all have a duty to safeguard children and this is a great example of how the Government and industry can work together to make the internet a safer place."

For more information:
Liz Greene
Optus Corporate Affairs
Tel: (02) 8082 1132