We’ve divided the page up into several sections:

	ICRAdiary	This is the most up to date information about what various members of the ICRA team are up to, events and conferences attended, meetings held etc.
	ICRAinfo	Links to more general information about ICRA and its place in the internet community.
	ICRAprojects	This is where you’ll find more detailed information about what ICRA is up to and where we’re heading.
	ICRApress	Links to press releases and press contacts.
	ICRAclippings	Links to online articles which relate either to ICRA directly or to internet safety in general.
		The Internet Content Rating Association is supported by the EU Internet Action Plan.

ICRAdiary

Issues for discussion are likely to include:

• Value Assessment techniques and the Semantic Web
• Content rating using semantic annotation
• New architecture for mobile device-enabled value assessment
• Value assessment of non-textual information
• Automatic content assessment information from Web contents
• Novel techniques for content selection and filtering
• Internationalization of value assessment mechanisms
• Privacy issues associated with value assessments

• WWW2004 website
• Call for Papers

• Conference website

Participation by Senior Bush Administration officials at the White House Conference on Missing, Exploited, and Runaway Children provided a visible demonstration of this Administration's commitment to creating a safer world for America's children. John Ashcroft, US Attorney General opened the conference, and US Secretary of State Colin Powell delivered the closing remarks. In addition, the attendees heard from Secretary of HHS Tommy Thompson, Secretary of Education, Roderick Paige, FBI Director Robert Mueller, OJJDP Administrator Bob Flores, and Margaret Spellings, Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy. After an emotional meeting with families of kidnapped children, both President and Mrs. Bush addressed the conference. President Bush said, "society had a duty, a solemn duty to shield children from exploitation and danger."

In addition to Bush Administration experts, the 600 attendees heard from experts in law enforcement, Parent Advocates, Academics, Researchers, and many American corporate leaders engaged in programs to protect America's children. The conference was co-sponsored by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

The theme of the conference revolved around the belief that while children make up just 25 percent of our population, they make up 100 percent of our future. The recurring themes of the conference were: 1) education, 2) training, and 3) community partnerships. All agreed that we want our children to walk around smart, not scared. We must teach our children how to be safe, how to make good choices in life.

The President announced the establishment of an Amber Alert Coordinator at the Department of Justice to enhance coordination among state and local plans and to give away $10 million in federal support for training and equipment upgrades.

More than 30 children have been found as a result of an Amber Alert in which local law enforcement officials distribute photos and other information about missing children and their abductors to television and radio stations using the Emergency Alert System created during the Cold War. Some stations are also flashing alerts to drivers using electronic billboards along the highway. The Amber Alert system is for us in very specific situations and not in every missing child case.

America Online announced beginning in November it would transmit Amber Alerts via desktop computers, cell phone, and pager to its 26 million subscribers who sign up for the alerts. Over 50,000 AOL users signed up the first day.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children estimate that overall, about 800,000 children are reported missing nationwide each year.

Striking a balance:

The control of children's media consumption

In September 2002, the a joint report published in London by The Independent Television Commission, The British Broadcasting Corporation and the Broadcasting Standards Commission made several references to ICRA. These comments articulate well the substantive criticisms made about the ICRA system, criticims that we both accept and welcome. However, the report was written without direct consultation with ICRA and thus the many positive actions that have and are being taken were not considered.

To see ICRA's full resposne to the report, please click here.

To see the full report, please click here. (Document is in PDF format)

Acting on recommendations made by the UK's Task Force on Child Protection, the Home Office has launched a public awareness campaign to deliver clear and consistent safety messages so that Internet users can enjoy the massive benefits of the Internet in safety.

Practical advice for parents is now available in Keeping your child safe on the Internet and the associated press release on both the initiative and the launch of a £1 million advertising campaign is available here.

International Chamber of Commerce backs ICRA

The International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) represents global business. ICC's membership includes companies of all sizes, in all sectors, and is geographically diverse. ICC has national committees, groups and direct members in over 130 countries around the world.

This ICC policy statement aims to provide governments, regulatory authorities and courts with a business perspective regarding the effect of content regulations on the Internet and electronic commerce. The first recommendation is to: "Allow self-regulation to demonstrate its efficacy --- Filtering, labelling and self-regulation on the Internet should be carefully considered as alternatives to legislation."

Read the full article.

GBDe Recommends ICRA labelling

The Global Business Dialogue on Electronic Commerce (GBDe) is a worldwide, CEO-driven effort to develop policies that promote global electronic commerce for the benefit of businesses and consumers everywhere. Members include CEOs of world leading corporations such as Cable & Wireless, Hitachi and Hewlett Packard. At their conference in Tokyo between the 13^th and 14^th of September, the Cyber Ethics Task Force under the chairmanship of Thomas Middlehoff, Chairman and CEO of Bertelsmann AG, recommended the use of PICS labelling and filtering in general and of the ICRA system in particular. To see the relevant extract from the final document In PDF format), please click here. For full details of GBDE, see their web site here.

The Council of Europe adopted a recommendation to its member states where it strongly supports self regulatory approaches to help protect children and preserve free speech on the internet. Self labelling is very much encouraged, and the recommendation gives a lot of detail to the criteria for self labelling. See the full text here or the press release here. (The Council of Europe brings together 43 European nations and is quite separate from the European Union).

Our major filtering project

ICRA and Digimarc present a scheme for labelling images!

SIFT Project

SIFT is ICRA's project under the European Union's Internet Action Plan. Led by Spanish family software developers Optenet and supported by the Greek National Centre for Scientific Research "Demokritos," the project is building on ICRAfilter in extraordinary ways to create a very powerful and flexible system known as ICRAplus.

For a complete introduction to the new filtering platform, please click here.

Protecting Kids with Digimarc™

ICRA is delighted to be working closely with Digimarc, the leader in digital watermark technology and applications, to bring a new kind of labelling to the internet. Using features already available in the some of thew world's leading image software, it is now possible to add a persistent "Adult content" flag to images. Known as Protecting Kids with Digimarc™ (or PKD for short), the system is complementary to the ICRA system and shares our "empowering parents through self-regulation" ethos. Although Digimarc's technology is well established throughout the world, PKD is a new venture with plans for future development already in place. For full details, please click here.

Eco to be ICRA representative in German speaking countries

Congressman Bob Goodlatte introduces legislation to make the internet safer for children. (PDF format)

Internet industry leaders gather for the launch of ICRAfilter.

Adult industry leaders unite to protect children from inappropriate content.

Netgem and the Internet Content Rating Association (ICRA) Cooperate on TV Web Parental Control

The Internet and children: finding the right balance (2^nd November 2001)

Web giants support content ratings (23^rd October 2001)