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."
