NZ – New Zealand filters the 'Net(Ars Technica)
New Zealand’s government-run Internet filtering system is now running, and two ISPs are already using the system. Seven thousand websites are on the list, most dealing with child sexual abuse, bestiality, and other illegal content, as classified by the country’s official censors. ISP participation remains voluntary. Currently, Maxnet and Watchdog are confirmed to be using the filter, though other ISPs are said to be interested. The filter uses a BSD Unix-based appliance called WhiteBox from Swedish company Netclean. The government runs the filtering server and maintains the blocklist, which it advertises to ISPs using the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). Because an IP address can host many domains, requests to blocked IP addresses are analyzed by the WhiteBox using deep packet inspection, rather than being blocked outright. If the requests are for non-problematic URLs, they are forwarded on; if they go to a banned site or link, they are blocked, the user’s IP address is logged, and a block message appears on the screen.

(Via QuickLinks Update.)