The OpenNet Initiative has just released the findings of its first global study of Internet filtering at St. Anne’s College at the University of Oxford; the culmination of five years of work and the first report of its kind.  It was the first public conference on Internet filtering hosted by the ONI -- with major assistance from the staff of the Oxford Internet Institute.

After ONI Research Director Rob Faris and Principal Investigator Ron Deibert presented the data, the ONI team solicited comments and questions from the audience of over 100 human rights activists, journalists, technologists, academics.  They discussed ways in which the communities in the room and around the world could use the findings to further their own research and advocacy.

The conference also marked the launch of the new ONI website that, in addition to several new functions, will host forty country profiles, eight regional overviews, and much more.

*You can find the latest coverage of the OpenNet Initiative and their findings from the San Jose Mercury News, BBC, Businessweek, MIT Technology Review, International Herald Tribune, IT News, Slashdot, and Digg.

*Berkman Fellows Dan Gillmor, Doc Searls, and Urs Gasser have blogged their thoughts on the results.

*Video of the plenary sessions is now available for download.  The entire conference will be available early next week on MediaBerkman.

The OpenNet Initiative is a partnership between the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, the Advanced Network Research Group at the Cambridge Security Programme at Cambridge University, and the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford.