Internet cafés question law’s provisions

The La Salle researchers saw that Republic Act 9775 allows the government to exercise “decentralized monitoring” of the Internet. Here, slightly edited, is the research project’s chapter on that subject:

Decentralized monitoring

The absence of an overarching policy on Internet regulation in the Philippines allows local government units (LGUs) to devise laws that govern the operation of local Internet Service Providers such as Internet cafés.

Internet cafés and kiosks serve as the basic and dominant online access point in the country. Yahoo-Nielsen (2009) reveals that 71 percent of Filipinos online access the Internet through Internet Cafés. Embodied in ordinances, local policies may include requirements in acquiring business permits, specifications in physical facilities, operating schedules, etc. However, the passage of R.A. 9775 mandates LGUs and local ISPs to implement the law. Respectively, Section 10 and Section 12 stipulate:

All mall owners/ operators and owners or lessors of other business establishments shall notify the Philippine National Police or National Bureau of Investigation that child pornography is being committed in their premises . . . Photo developers, information technology professionals, credit card companies and banks who has direct knowledge of any form of child pornography activities shall have the duty to report . . .

The local governments of the city or municipality where an Internet café or kiosk is located shall have the authority to monitor and regulate the establishment and operation of the same similar establishments in order to prevent violation of the provisions of this Act…

In the context of this legislative development, Mr. Ed Zafra of I-Café Pilipinas, the national consortium of Internet Café Owners and Operators in the country, reiterates that there is no need to initiate legislation on national ISP-level filtering to address child pornography. According to him, Internet Café owners in the Philippines have continuously been advocating against child pornography. In their respective businesses, Internet shops have been prohibiting access to pornographic materials.

There has been relative success in these efforts. Initiatives with LGUs have been implemented to avert cases of cyber prostitution such as in Marikina City. Within the ranks of local ISPs, engaging in child pornography is most likely detrimental to their business interests.

Mr. Zafra also lamented the zeroing in on Internet cafes while most child pornographic materials are not accessed in public Internet Café Shops but through personal PC connections and purchased DVD containing pornographic materials.

Filtering materials

Other local ISPs are in fact using filtering devices on their own capacity and resources.

In terms of profitability, Internet Café Owners believe that requiring all ISPs to install a filtering device will be detrimental to their business.

Besides frequent disconnections, Internet connection speed advertised for cafés at say 3 Mbps (megabits per second) are in actual download tests averaging much less. Pilot testing on web filtering done in Australia showed that ISP performance would suffer network degradation of up to 70 percent if more accurate censoring will be performed (Meloni, 2008).

The repercussion would be the need for Internet Cafés to subscribe to higher speed hence increasing DSL subscription costs.
Whether or not LGUs or national government agencies such as the NTC will allow the utilization of free and open source filtering software remains an issue.

Installation of a filtering device requires license making it more expensive to run a small Internet Café business. Moreover, the installation of cyber filter software will also demand training and capacity building to all operators from the private and the public sector. The group also questioned how such broad policy will be financed considering the lack of resources, finance, and capacity among the government agencies especially concerned with the IT sector in the Philippines. –Manila Times