THE inventor of the world wide web says he is fighting to keep the internet out of the hands of powerful people who threaten its freedom.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee said he is up against "big companies" which want to tweak the laws to have "tremendous" control over the lives of web users.

He also denied his creation, now 25 years old, has been tainted by ever-evolving obstacles, from spying to child pornography, and described it as a "neutral platform" which reflects all aspects of humanity.

The London-born computer scientist, 59, has been marking the quarter-century of the revolution he started by campaigning for an online "Magna Carta" of rules which would enshrine the independence of the internet and the privacy of its users.