Senator Coonan then sought to discredit Tom, who lives with his parents in Melbourne, saying he "continued to seek notoriety using any means possible". Labor's communications spokesman, Stephen Conroy, shot back yesterday accusing Senator Coonan of over-stepping the mark by attacking a 16-year-old schoolboy "who only wants to make the internet safer".

"Well I feel quite offended by Senator Coonan actually," Tom said in an email interview last night. "I think it's quite low that Senator Coonan would attack my credibility - as with my experiences, I have been pushing hard for this year to do whatever I can do, whether that be by exposing inadequacies, or pushing for improvements on cyber-safety - with a common aim of improving it." After receiving widespread international media attention for exposing how it was possible to bypass the Government's internet filters within minutes, Tom was invited to speak about internet safety at a range of conferences including the National Cyberian Embassy and National Coalition Against Bullying conferences in Victoria, and - via weblink - the NetSafe conference in New Zealand.

The filters, which can be downloaded from NetAlert.gov.au, were designed to prevent kids from accessing inappropriate internet content. Tom, who insists he is apolitical, sought meetings with both the Government and Opposition to discuss cyber safety issues and inadequacies with the current system.

He also set up a blog, The Wood Verdict, where he outlined his policy recommendations. He said he was in the process of becoming a "cyber-columnist" for Girlfriend magazine. "I didn't get a reply from Liberals," Tom said. "I met with the Shadow Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy for over an hour a few weeks ago, discussing all of these things and recommending some bold policy directions - specifically establishing a Youth Advisory Committee, Establishing a collaborative panel to co-ordinate all national initiatives, support for much more research projects, the overhauling [of] the NetAlert website and Hotline, the addition of an online Chatline, and most notably the compulsory training of teachers, leading to education for all year levels, in all schools in the nation, plus make it all dynamic so it can all be updated as it evolves."

He said Senator Conroy adopted virtually all of his recommendations which were spelt out in an policy announcement on cyber-safety on Monday. Tom appeared with Senator Conroy at the policy launch. Senator Conroy said today Labor consulted with a number of people and organisations but Tom was "integral" to the development of its cyber-safety policy, particularly the youth-oriented strategies.

"Tom has a genuine understanding of cyber-safety issues being a digital native and having suffered such cyber-issues as computer addiction," Senator Conroy said. Before Monday, the only major internet safety-related policy announced by Labor was internet content filtering at the service provider level for all Australian homes, schools and public computers. "From a virtually 'ISP-Filter that's it' policy from before this happened, he [Senator Conroy] called me back to meet two weeks ago - and to my amazement - he was willing to implement virtually every policy I recommended - bringing my goal to life at a Federal level!," Tom said.

"Being careful not to brag too much, I really don't think any of this would have happened if it was not for the collaboration between us." Tom said his parents were "both very supportive and proud" but they were keen to ensure his extra-curricular activities did not detract from his results at school.

He said the only monetary reward he had received for his efforts was a JB Hi-Fi voucher after presenting at a primary school in Melbourne earlier this month. "I'm in the middle of exams at the moment - so it's a bit of a challenge of balancing it all up - but I love doing it all so I keep going," Tom said. "My parents are both very supportive and proud - but they want to make sure it doesn't inflict on academic progress - and keep my head on the ground ... I spend all my IT class at school googling my name now."

The schoolboy was critical of the Government's NetAlert policies, a $189 million package of cyber-safety measures unveiled by Senator Coonan earlier this year, saying it was ineffective. "Much of the actual current advice is irrelevant, jumbled, too complex, too vague, and it misses out on a lot," he said.

"That's the same with the hotline. The education and teacher training resources are just really out-of-date and don't cover it in it's full detail. The education isn't mandated and hardly taken up by any schools anyway."