INTERNET RELAY CHAT COMMUNICATIONS INFRASTRUCTURE (Legislation to regulate use)

Dr Toh See Kiat asked the Minister for Information and the Arts whether the Government intends to introduce legislation to criminalise or regulate the use of Internet Relay Chat communications infrastructure that lure women into rape and molest situations.

The Minister for Information and the Arts (BG George Yong-Boon Yeo): Sir, Internet enables people to communicate with each other. Services like the Internet Relay Chat, e-mail, Internet telephony, video conferencing and others facilitate this.

The Singapore Broadcasting Authority, or SBA, regulates the use of the Internet for broadcasting purposes. It does not regulate e-mail and Internet Relay Chat, which are regarded as private communications.

The answer to the dangers posed by services like the Internet Relay Chat is not legislation or regulation but, as Assoc. Prof. Ho said, public education and common sense. SBA will do what it can to educate the public on what is potentially harmful in the Internet. However, this is not only for SBA to do. Parents, teachers and community leaders must also play their part.

Regardless of the means used, anyone who lures women into rape and molest situations is in serious breach of the law.

Dr Toh See Kiat: Mr Speaker, Sir, unfortunately, for many parents, the only thing they know about the Internet is how to spell it and pronounce it. Will SBA help this process by having public education programmes? I think the press releases recently were not enough. Will SBA also consider the question I asked earlier on of Prof. Ho, ie, obliging the ISPs to provide a family service that allows parents to block off IRC, if they consider it unproductive or bad for the children?

BG George Yong-Boon Yeo: SBA will do its share of the education, but this burden cannot be on SBA alone. As to whether we should ban IRC because some bad things happen on IRC, I think that would not be a good move because relay chats are very useful for a whole range of private communications. Whether some bad things take place within relay chats? Bad things happen on the phone line, through the fax machine and through the postal system. We cannot ban all these things just because some bad things happen within this medium.