Hello SM,
On Sat, May 16, 2015 at 8:05 PM, S Moonesamy <sm+mu_at_elandsys.com> wrote:
>
>
> I read the blog article at
> http://hacklog.in/internet-filtering-in-mauritius/ about "Internet
> filtering in Mauritius". I also read the letter (
> http://hacklog.in/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/ICTA_reply-Internet-filtering-Mauritius.pdf
> ) which is available for public consultation.
>
Thank you for your analysis.
The letter states that the project to do the above was "preceded by a
> series of discussions and dialogues with various stakeholders namely the
> Data Protection Office, Ombudsperson for Children, Internet Service
> Providers, the Police, the media and representatives of consumer
> organisations". During a meeting, a representative of the ICTA pointed out
> that the Consumer Protection Agency can represent consumers in Mauritius.
> I pointed out that a government agency would not put the interests of
> consumers before the interests of the government. A "series of discussions
> and dialogues" is not a public consultation.
>
I agree that "a government agency would not put the interests of consumers
before the interests of the government". I did not find any glossary of
terms on icta.mu to be able to find their meaning of "public consultation".
> According to APEC-OECD, "Regulations should be developed in an open and
> transparent fashion, with appropriate and well-publicised procedures for
> effective and timely inputs from interested national and foreign parties,
> such as affected business, trade unions, wider interest groups such as
> consumer or environmental organisations, or other levels of government.
> Public consultation should not be limited to insiders, such as already
> established businesses, but should be open to all interested parties". Was
> this project to regulate or curtail illegal content on the internet
> undertaken in an open and transparent fashion? Based on the contents of
> the letter I do not think so.
>
Thank you for providing this reference. It could prove useful in the
future.
> I do not understand the "campaign of gratuitous false allegations against
> the Authority" in the last paragraph of the letter. There were three
> internet users in Mauritius who wrote to Dr. M K Oolun about the "National
> Internet Filtering System". I wrote to the Information and Communication
> Technologies Authority as perversive monitoring is a concern. I did some
> research before asking the Authority about whether there has been a public
> consultation. Should I be docile and not ask any questions when I have a
> concern? How can I find out whether there is a "National Internet
> Filtering System" if I cannot ask the Authority questions about that?
>
I was surprised with the last paragraph too. I had hoped ICTA would
provide me proper references and maybe transcripts/notes that could support
how & why of the discussions of 2011. Alas, I was rather asked to be
silent.
> The press article also states that the ICTA intervened twice before to
> block web sites because "le contenu avait été remplacé par des images
> pornographiques". Wouldn't it be better for the government and the Mahatma
> Gandhi Institute to stop their web server instead of it blocking access to
> the web sites? How were those web sites blocked if there wasn't any
> internet filtering system in Mauritius before 7 February 2011?
>
>
This is indeed an interesting question, how did ICTA block Facebook in
2007 without an Internet filtering system? Hmm. I heard last year while
gov.mu was inaccessible around the world, it still remained accessible
within Mauritius. Could ICTA have played part in the availability of gov.mu
even though its DNS records were wiped? Is there any name in the DNS
terminology for such actions?
Cheers,
--
Ish Sookun
- Geek by birth, Linux by choice.
- I blog at HACKLOG.in.
https://twitter.com/IshSookun ^^ Do you tweet?
Received on Sat May 16 2015 - 17:05:41 PST