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Australian State Blocks YouTube in Public Schools to Counter Cyber Bullying
The Australian State of Victoria has banned the popular Internet film-sharing website YouTube from school computers in the state’s 1600 public schools in a bid to clamp down on cyber-bullying. The move follows public outrage after a group of schoolboys filmed themselves sexually abusing and degrading a teenage girl and uploaded the video onto YouTube. Despite YouTube’s stated terms of use, which bans unlawful, threatening, hateful and racially or ethnically offensive material, it took over three months for the video to be removed.
The Education Services Minister, Jacinta Allen, indicated that schools would also be required to update their anti-bullying policies. However, Ms Allen acknowledged that the ban would not prevent students from accessing or publishing content on YouTube outside of school hours and facilities. As the schools and their ISPs already engage in a system of filtering website access, the measure merely adds YouTube to a list of banned websites. The ban has been met with some criticisms, with opponents claiming that it will encourage students to find methods to defeat the blocks, or to seek alternative methods of accessing the blocked content.
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