Hi! I created this petition and will be heading for the Monday meeting. I’m just thinking about this, but given that this is something with such huge national impact, can it be argued that this is something that should be debated on a national scale, for example in parliament?

The government can counter that MCMC has a mandate under CMA 1998 to perform internet restrictions and say that it’s ’protecting’ people say - but are there any other arguments that should be brought to bear?

If necessary, I will get personal friends in politics (ie not a random call YB situation) to raise this issue as well.

This post has been edited by Exoflare: Sep 8 2024, 11:36 AM

I’ll still be talking to MCMC since they did help me in the past (Minister Fahmi filed a legal request on my behalf to Meta to remove someone who was yapping too much about his so called ethnic privilege) and I would like to meet them personally.

I think that this is a continuation of that help, but I think maybe it’s too arrogant to say that that’s the case - I want to understand why they did this, though, so I will talk to them tomorrow.

This post has been edited by Exoflare: Sep 8 2024, 06:56 PM

Hi all, it was nice to see some of you today! No selfies featuring other individuals (some stakeholders include PDRM officials from Bukit Aman, Securities Commission, members of the Entrepreneur community and Open Source community, and members of MCMC), but here's one featuring me.



Interesting session overall.

Learned a little bit about MCMC's thinking today at the MCMC Dialogue Session. Minister Fahmi himself didn't come, but we did have a few people led by Datuk Mohamed Sulaiman Sultan Suhaibuddeen, Chief Network Security Officer at MCMC who were kind enough to share their thoughts.

Here are some of the things that we discussed.

1. DNS Redirection: We received a technical overview of DNS Redirection and how it helps block harmful content like online scams and illegal sites. A good bit of this is on my petition.

2. Protecting the Malaysian People and Recent Problems: MCMC talked about the existing internet blocking regime and the principles that underpin it, noting that this blocking took part as part of an initiative to protect Malaysian users, to protect consumers, to protect the vulnerable groups, noting that MCMC has been undertaking access restriction measures to block access to harmful and malicious websites and highlighting that it had blocked 24277 websites since August 2018.

Link: https://www.change.org/p/oppose-the-malaysi...edirection-plan

MCMC talked about the existing internet blocking regime and the principles that underpin it, noting that this blocking took part as part of an initiative to protect Malaysian users, to protect consumers, to protect the vulnerable groups, noting that MCMC has been undertaking access restriction measures to block access to harmful and malicious websites and highlighting that it had blocked 24277 websites since August 2018, comprising Gambling (39%), Pornography/Obscene Content (31%), Copyright Infringement (14%), Prostitution (2%), Unlawful Investments/Scams (2%) and Other Harmful Sites (12%).



MCMC acknowledged the recent issues with redirection etc, noting that MCMC had only asked ISPs to enforce existing internet restrictions more effectively, noting the recent challenges that some users faced with TIME and etc were due to individual ISP implementations, not the overall system itself. MCMC clarified that the core issue lies in how some ISPs applied the DNS redirection, which resulted in disruptions for users.


3. Existing Initiatives:


MCMC talked about some of its existing education initiatives, but asked if this was sufficient as it engaged the audience for suggestions while fielding criticisms about its approach on a variety of different fronts during Q&A; my contribution was to note that the engagement session proposed was quite last minute, to highlight that people thought that this negotiation was in bad faith to a degree, and to note that a discussion of such far-reaching impact and scope is something that should be discussed in Malaysian Parliament as well. MCMC seemed to take this well, but we'd have to see.






4. Miscellaneous:

Interesting points about Malaysian society and good questions from the floor about privacy, about issues with the implementation and how this breaks with respect to IoT, DNS Hijacking, and other things along the way. MCMC also noted that it is looking to expand public engagement, making sure that everyone from tech experts to everyday users understands the policies and has a chance to give feedback.


Overall:

It was a good session - a very conversational one. I hope MCMC is serious about public engagement, because that's what I think the Malaysian public deserves.

Good questions from the floor about privacy, about issues with the implementation and how this breaks with respect to IoT, DNS Hijacking, and other things along the way!