One of the Internet's most popular features — Newsgroups — can now be made safer for children.

CSIRO's recently launched Newsgroup software, Oz Insight, now includes password-control, giving parents control over which Newsgroups their children can access. The software will be on display next week in the United States at a major Internet show.

There are over 35,000 different Newsgroups — the Internet's electronic meeting places — where around 25 million people worldwide exchange information about a huge diversity of subjects. Together they make up the 'Usenet' that is accessed through client software like Oz Insight.

"The Usenet is a great resource, but it is notorious for adult content," says CSIRO's Jack Bhalla, Director of the Oz Insight project.

"Parents need to be able to choose which Newsgroups can be accessed," he says.

"As a parent, I like to know where my kids are, and that includes knowing which electronic meeting places they visit.

"Oz Insight allows parents to control which Newsgroups their kids visit, while still giving them access to the useful information held on the Usenet.

"Whether it's doing school projects, talking to fellow horse-lovers, finding independent medical information or getting a clue to completing the latest computer game, Newsgroups have plenty to offer," he says.

Oz Insight restricts Usenet access by allowing only selected Newsgroups to be used. All users can browse through lists of available Newsgroups to check for any new groups of interest, but only the password holder — in this case the parent — can actually give access.

"We've taken the approach of controlling access by selected inclusion of content, rather than the approach taken by Internet control software of excluding, or censoring, undesirable content," says Mr Bhalla.

"It has been repeatedly shown that the censorship approach just doesn't work. Any new or re-located content escapes censorship.

"With our approach, when new, useful, Newsgroups appear, kids can ask their parents to add them to the list of groups which are accessible. That makes the system flexible and still lets new content be scrutinised.

"It is a more pragmatic and manageable approach for the dynamic Internet environment," he says.

Oz insight is a suite of software products. It includes an advanced Usenet server, the companion all-in-one client and a unique web-based gateway to the Usenet.

Oz Insight brings a new generation of features to the Usenet through a patented extension of the NTTP protocol — the protocol that underlies the Usenet.

The extended protocol allows Oz Insight to handle multimedia objects intelligently, making downloading items quicker and more efficient and making multimedia-rich Newsgroups easier and cheaper to use.

The unique features of the Oz Insight client include previewing multimedia objects before download and automatic rejection of unwanted spam and duplicate postings. This reduces the frustrating and costly hours Usenet users currently spend downloading large multimedia objects based only on their description.

The advanced server also offers savings to Internet service providers hosting Newsgroups. It reduces bandwidth and disk-space requirements by at least 30% by handling multimedia objects intelligently.

ISPCon 2000 runs from November 8-10 at the San Jose McEnery Convention Centre, USA.