SafeNet
 
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Internet has been providing the spaces for new opportunities and challenges to lots of people as the voluntary and creative space as well as the international information network. However, the obscene and violent information has been rapidly increasing due to the anonymity and commerciality of Internet in the flip side to the positive aspect. Nevertheless, no safety measures or orders are settled in reality.
This can provide very confusing values to adolescents using Internet and sometimes may cause very dangerous consequences.
The efforts to protect adolescents from those negative impacts are the international trend and have been unanimously recognized as the social responsibilities of content providers. Therefore, various solutions such as blocking softwares, kids zone and constitution of relevant laws are attempted.
Internet content rating service, one of the efforts to protect adolescents and to secure the rights of content users to select information makes the content providers to fulfill their social responsibilities as strengthening the reliability of information. This service has been also recognized in the world as providing the protection tools for adolescents to the information users.
This system is one of methods that the entire society requests the responsibility for online services to content providers and the content providers themeselves can abide by these responsibilities. Meanwhile, making reliable online services is also meaningful to content providers. When online spaces are recognized as healthy and reliable spaces, these spaces can be the places to contribute to the quality of human's life.

Internet content rating service makes the content providers voluntarily rate contents and the information users filter unwanted information by applying the appropriate level.
 
Development of PICS(Platform for Internet Content Selection) technology that is the standard technology for
.... Internet content classification on the basis of W3C(World Wide Web Consortium) in 1995.
The discussion on how to apply PICS as the technology for rating was firstly proposed by IHPEG(Information
.... Highway Parental Empowerment Group) in 1996.
As unwholesome information on Internet was raised as the social issues such as Cyberporn debate on the
.... Times in 1996 and the Communication Decency Act in 1996 to 1997, Internet content rating service using PICS
.... was emerged as the reasonable measure.
Rating services such as RSACi(Recreational Software Advisory Council on the Internet) and SafeSurf that
.... proposed the rating criteria using PICS and then embodied them as the method for content control were
.... presented.
PICS related technologies were accepted as the method of "Internet Access Control without Censorship".
Main advanced informatization countries including America, Japan and EU member countries executed or will
.... execute independent rating services.
America : Diverse rating services such as ICRA, SafeSurf, etc. are executed(Self-regulation type led by
.................. private companies)
Japan : "Safety Online", independent rating service, was implemented with the initiative of ENC(Electronic
............... Network Consortium) under the supervision of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, and
............... NMDA(New Media Development Association) executed Internet content rating service using the
............... standards of Safety Online.
EU : EC established long-term plans and combined them with the efforts of self regulation by private sectors.
............ Information Society Project Office of EC executed the quadrennial plan(1999~2002) for the implementation
........... of the safe Internet environment(compromise between the governmental regulation and self regulation)
Singapore and Australia emphasize the joint regulation of the government, companies and citizens.
 
For the safety on Internet, parents' and teachers' concerns as well as the institutional supports and content providers' responsibilities are more important than anything else. We recommend to use Internet content rating service or useful filtering software. As one of these efforts, Korea Communications Standards Commission proposes 'SafeNet' as the criteria for Internet content service.
'SafeNet' was made to fit to our situation on the basis of international standards. The present classification standard consists of 5 levels(from level 0 to level 4) in 5 categories. 'SafeNet' was designed as considering the compatibility with the rating standards of RSACi, ICRA and ENC that have been internationally executed. Therefore, the application of filtering software for Internet content rating service will secure this compatibility.


The Korea Communications Standards Commission will make every effort for the early settlement and development of Internet content rating service and for more reliable and safer service.