Computer (illustration)
Computer (illustration)iStock

A bill to ensure cleaner internet in Israel, which was approved Sunday by the Ministerial Committee for Legislation, will not be promoted in its current format.

The proposed legislation would have required all Israeli internet service providers (ISPs) to automatically filter any pornographic or violent content unless a customer specifically requests that sites containing such content be unfiltered.

Previous legislation to deal with the widespread access to inappropriate content online had merely mandated that ISPs provide customers with the option to place filters on their internet service, rather than mandating that the filters be used by default.

However, the Communications Ministry, it was reported Monday, is strongly opposed to the law as it is currently written, and has expressed this opposition to one of its initiators, MK Shuli Mualem (Jewish Home).

Mualem, who realized that the bill may encounter difficulties in passing in its current format, agreed to implement significant changes to its wording before advancing it further. In fact, the reworded bill will not change the current situation in terms of screening sites for customers.

The watered down bill does not include blocking of the internet, and customers who are interested in filtering inappropriate sites can request this filtering, but unlike the original proposal, this will not be the default situation.