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‘Extraordinary’ hacking powers pass Australian Parliament

225 points by peterkelly 5y ago

xvector 5y ago
Australia is a disaster when it comes to electronic freedoms. It might just be a lost cause at this point. A classic example of why you really shouldn't be giving the government too much power, because even so-called "modern democracies" can and will go bad. Backdoors in encryption, free for all to hack citizens, etc. What a mess. Hope some people fight back.
- neonate 5y ago
  Is it limited to Australia or can they just share whatever with the other 'Five Eyes'?
  - corty 5y ago
    Of course they'll share it. First, non-citizens are usually even less protected than citizens. Second, secret services are also extralegal services as long as they can get away with it. Third, if they get caught, they won't be punished. German example: The BND has been caught spying on all Germans' communication (most probably still does so), as well as connections to foreign countries. They are only supposed to watch foreign countries. So they came up with a legal theory, called "Weltraumtheorie", where satellites are in space, so outside the jurisdiction of any state. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weltraumtheorie https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weltraumtheorie Later on, when this got out, it was just legalized and extended to fibre connections, because, well, that just replaces space, doesn't it?...
    - danuker 5y ago
      Doesn't this backfire? As in, you are free to commit wire fraud, because of this similarity to "international waters"?
      - corty 5y ago
        Theoretically. Practically, that legal theory is just a smokescreen for the willingness of the government to overlook any misdeeds by the secret services. Prosecutors and courts got the hint and didn't investigate any further. However, if you are a non-state-sponsored criminal, of course you will be prosecuted. "Qvod licet iovi, non licet bovi" is a very important legal principle ;) Also, later on, the government just legalized what the BND was doing, thereby invalidating any future attempt at prosecution for that past crime against the BND. Yet still maintaining the illegality for everyone else.
  - ajkdhcb2 5y ago
    It is indeed opening doors for international cooperation: >"I think we've started to fill a void, a niche for the Americans to get around a few legal hurdles domestically" https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-10/nsw-operation-ironside-privacy-in-wake-of-afp-raids/100202924 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-10/nsw-operation-ironsid...
  - xvector 5y ago
    Oh, it is definitely common for other countries to go through Australia to bypass laws or legal hurdles locally. This has been used to catch many cyber criminals.
- m0zg 5y ago
  Not just "electronic" freedoms anymore. They're currently locked down with the lockdown enforced by their own military from what I have seen. Serves them right, too, for giving up the last backstop on the government power: guns.
  - pugio 5y ago
    You're conflating two very different things. The lockdowns are instituted at the state level, are different in every state, and are with the specific aim of (and in response to) preventing covid transmission. Adhering to a public health lockdown has nothing to do with Freedom, or lack of guns. By making a false comparison between the two, you are muddying any argument made against the electronic freedom restrictions.
    - logicchains 5y ago
      >Adhering to a public health lockdown has nothing can do with Freedom Regardless of what the justification given is, limiting people's freedom of movement and association is by definition a restriction of their freedom.
      - pugio 5y ago
        I apologize for my lack of clarity. I intended my capitalization of "Freedom" to stand in for a particular philosophy, which I did not clearly explicate. To restate: I think the COVID lockdowns are a very different case from these electronic restrictions, in scope, duration, reason, and advisability. A critique which cites both as similar examples of government overreach is missing its mark.
        AussieWog93 5y ago
        I say this as a fellow Aussie who thinks both gun control and COVID lockdowns are good, sensible policies (although I'm starting to get sick of the latter): both of those things are absolutely limitations on freedom, even in the libertarian philosophical sense, and at least partly explains why Americans are so strongly against them. Freedom is about being able to do whatever the hell you want, so long as you don't restrict the freedom of others. It's not about being good or wise or socially responsible or even sane - it's just about nobody being able to stop you from doing whatever it is you want.
- jay_kyburz 5y ago
  It only takes one progressive government to roll it all back. Vote Green.
  - l332mn 5y ago
    Care to give some examples of when this has happened?
    - vermilingua 5y ago
      It's never happened because Australians would never vote Green. Aside from having the public image as a bunch of hippies and crackpots, a huge chunk of our voter base just want to sit on their nest eggs, which the Libs (current govt.) promise to help with. Another huge chunk just vote how their parents vote. The only reason Australians (generalising) vote at all, is because we'd get fined if we didn't. With donkey votes (vandalised ballots) counted as votes for the current government, this country exists to hold the status quo.
      - AussieWog93 5y ago
        >With donkey votes (vandalised ballots) counted as votes for the current government That is completely untrue. Informal votes are not counted at all.
        kwhitefoot 5y ago
        That's odd. In the UK spoiled ballots are quite definitely counted. "The number of Blank Votes and Spoiled Ballots are read out at the count, along with the results and are also included in subsequent reports. Your apathy towards the political parties will be heard not just forgotten." https://votingcounts.org.uk/spoilt-ballot https://votingcounts.org.uk/spoilt-ballot
        AussieWog93 5y ago
        My apologies, bad wording. They're counted here too - just not towards any particular political party.
- einarfd 5y ago
  > A classic example of why you really shouldn't be giving the government too much power, because even so-called "modern democracies" can and will go bad. I'm not an expert, but I'm under the impression that Australia uses a "first past the post" / "simple majority" voting system. If that is true, calling it a "modern democracy" seems deeply misguided, democracy yes, modern no.
  - softveda 5y ago
    Not true at all. Australian federal election House of Representatives uses a preferential voting system where you have to number every candidate in your order of preference 1..N. Also voting (or at least attending) is compulsory.
  - saithound 5y ago
    Not even close. The Australian electoral system uses instant-runoff for the House, and single-transferable-vote for the Senate.
    - Jensson 5y ago
      That has almost the same results as first past the post though.
      - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
        Kinda, but that "almost the same" occasionally counts for some significant differences. Australian politics is dominated by the two major parties, but the minor parties form a reasonable percentage of held seats, and occasionally neither major party holds a majority, which leads to a hung parliament where the balance of power is open to negotiation. https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Senators/Senate_composition https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Senators/Senate_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_House_of_Representatives https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_House_of_Representa...
- benjaminjt 5y ago
  I wrote to my local federal "representative", just as I did with the Assistance and Access Act. I convinced others to contact theirs too. But even if we convince one politician that they should vote no, I strongly suspect they would vote with their party anyway. It just doesn't feel like representative democracy any more.
unknownOrigin 5y ago
Organized crime gangs... please. Look at what they're doing in relation to Covid. Crime gangs... Australia is nuts.
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  > Organized crime gangs Largely (albeit not completely) created by the state thanks to drug criminalization. For fuck's sake.
  - bigiain 5y ago
    And don't forget the Big Blue Gang. Funded and empowered by the state, and totally unaccountable... “I have said before, if you write a ticket, and you get it wrong, I understand, and I won’t hold you to account for that. We have to shape the behaviour of people to get out of lockdown, and I know all of us want to be out of lockdown by Christmas, so please take the challenge.“ -- NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller, https://www.smh.com.au/national/police-commissioner-says-officers-wrongly-issuing-tickets-won-t-be-held-to-account-20210819-p58k76.html https://www.smh.com.au/national/police-commissioner-says-off...
- fsflover 5y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalypse https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocal...
vermilingua 5y ago
The tech industry in Australia has for some time existed in an impossibly hostile climate, with onerous tasks to betray their own users able to be handed out to individuals at any time, with virtually no oversight. [1] This has all happened under the auspices of the most overtly corrupt and authoritarian government we’ve had in my lifetime, within four years. If I had the option, I’d pack up and move, but having written this and other anti-government sentiment, it’s entirely possible that they stop me at the border. [2] Combining this with the political apathy of nearly everyone here that I know, the current vilification of protestors (not entirely wrongly given the circumstances), and the utter spinelessness and complicity of the “opposition”, I don’t see a future for my country that doesn’t involve violent revolution (we’ve tried it before [3]) or tyranny. But it gets better: the tech industry is not only under attack, they’re complicit. Beyond even the ordinary run-of-the-mill scumbaggery we see from tech companies, a number have recently formed the Tech Council of Australia [4], aiming to make Australia a startup capital of the world. Scroll down that page and you’ll see a list of member corporations, several of which sent opposition to the AABill when consultation was open. Now, apparently, they’ve decided that it’s too hard to beat ‘em, so they’ll join ’em. [1] https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bills/r6195_aspassed/toc_pdf/18204b01.pdf;fileType=application%2Fpdf https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi... [2] https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/leaving-australia https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/leaving-australia [3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eureka_Rebellion https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eureka_Rebellion [4] https://techcouncil.com.au https://techcouncil.com.au
- bjarneh 5y ago
  > but having written this and other anti-government sentiment, it’s entirely possible that they stop me at the border. I've seen "Border Control Australia", and if leaving the country is anywhere near as difficult as entering it, you're in for a rough time. "Do you have dirt from another country under your shoes?" /s
  - arcticbull 5y ago
    Reading the link, it appears that travel abroad is currently restricted due to COVID. Ordinarily, I don't believe Australia practices any meaningful exit controls beyond the usual: visa overstays, warrants. Certainly not capriciously based on your feelings regarding the current administration. In fact, I believe it's automated.
Lio 5y ago
What does this mean for the Australian tech industry? Should people be concerned about keeping commercial secrets in systems run Atlassian or Fastmail? The oversight here seems to just be one copper asking his mate to give him the nod to go on a fishing trip whenever he likes.
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  I think this is key. I wonder if Atlassian will release a statement.
  - mikeyjk 5y ago
    Afaik they operate out of the US. I'm not sure if the NSA is really any better, perhaps just less forthright. I mean, I don't know what to believe, the whole FBI app.le thing makes me feel less cynnical about the chance of NSA knocking on the door in the name of national security - but I've heard they can do that, which seems like you'd have no choice. As a programmer from Australia though I can't believe they are passing these laws. Seriously depressing.
patchtopic 5y ago
As an Australian I am disgusted by these clowns who are in government.
- CaptainBanger 5y ago
  Mate, my only hope at this point is a Labor / Greens Coalition that makes it an election promise to aggressively target and rollback these laws.
LeoPanthera 5y ago
Fastmail is an Australian company and I would love to hear their response to this. Even though their servers are not located in Australia I bet that wouldn't slow the government down much.
- Semaphor 5y ago
  Their datacenters are in the US and they have always complied with legal requests. So this, like the backdoor law, doesn’t seem to change much. Both the US and AUS can access your e-mail if they just get a judge to sign a warrant (which, if Germany is any indication, is barely a hurdle).
simfoo 5y ago
As much as I love Fastmail, I think it's time to move elsewhere. I don't feel safe trusting a Australia based company with my online identity after all those hostile laws.
- yosito 5y ago
  While I understand the feeling, if you're emailing with anyone who doesn't use an encrypted provider (which is probably >99% of your email), state actors are easily capable of surveiling all of your email anyway, no matter what provider you use. Email isn't a secure form of communication. The advantage of a provider like Fastmail is that they're not profiling you based on your data like Google would do.
  - antihero 5y ago
    But could, for instance, the Australian government compel Fastmail to hand over and hide a silent password reset email for any of my accounts, more easily than they could another provider?
    - yosito 5y ago
      Unless that password reset is sent in an encrypted email, it can easily be intercepted, no matter what your email provider is.
      - antihero 5y ago
        Is this done at an infrastructure level? IE, what level of access is need to just sniff up emails? Can anyone set up a relay or do you have to be a trusted entity?
  - simfoo 5y ago
    I get your point. As a EU citizen though, I want to at least have a way to realistically fight a lawful intrusion after the fact. If I understand the Australian laws correctly, they are mostly enabling hidden surveillance. I'll be trying out https://mailbox.org/en https://mailbox.org/en as an alternative. They seem to have good PGP infra and are hosted in Germany.
make3 5y ago
can't close the subscription box on Firefox mobile, making the site unusable
- circularfoyers 5y ago
  I was able to close it on Firefox on Android, on both stable and nightly release channels.
- mmahemoff 5y ago
  Workaround - read it on Pocket (owned by Mozilla).
- saladuh 5y ago
  Same, on the fdroid build. I just put in an obviously, nonsensical email.
ponco 5y ago
Kick this mob out.
michaelmrose 5y ago
Could this force or encourage people to provide backdoors that could ultimately be used by parties outside of Australia to spy on people other than Australians?
- fuckyouriotshit 5y ago
  Why do you think the Five-Eyes agreement exists? This is exactly the sort "capability" that is designed to be used through the legal loophole of "you spy on our citizens and we'll spy on yours" which is the (realpolitik) basis of the Five-Eyes intelligence sharing agreement.
mantenpanther 5y ago
I always thought of Australia as an open and freedom loving country and planned to visit sometime. But what I'm reading in the (European) news the last months regarding all kinds of crackdowns on individual freedom sounds really bad and disturbing to me. Maybe it's just the news-providers here who report selectively, or are the Aussies really on board with this authoritarian direction of the government?
- jlangenauer 5y ago
  I'm from Australia, but live in Germany, and have been just horrified at what's happened back there. It's as though the country has lost its mind. My personal theory is that it's a manifestation of fear and insecurity. Australia, and many of its citizens have always had a certain lack of confidence, which is often covered up by bravado about being "the best country in the world" (as if there even is such a thing) and things like the tall poppy syndrome, currently often directed at expats("Too good to live in Australia, are you?") On top of this, a huge amount of fear has been manufactured over the Covid-19 pandemic, both by the media seeking clicks, and by politicians seeking electoral advantage. This is one of the most shameful aspects of the entire thing to me: the deliberate emotional abuse of the population. The contrast between Dan Andrew's daily fear-mongering and berating of "rule-breakers" and Angela Merkel, most of whose public statements during the pandemic were about reassuring the German people (with occasional expressions of "concern" at most when things were going badly) has been stark for me. Even Jactinta Ardern has been much more measured in her statements, although NZ wasn't immune from madness like banning the delivery of fiction books. And so, yes, I think a lot of Australians are on board with the border closures, the lockdowns and the like, which is astonishing to me, but I think the degree of fear there is what fundamentally explains it. As for government snooping, hardly anyone in Australia cares.
  - mantenpanther 5y ago
    Using fear constantly is the most powerful tool to influence people, this became really clear to me the last 18 months. I hope politicians and media will get down to a more rational style of communicating, but I'm not too optimistic about it. Many countries experienced the dire consequences of a constant climate of fear in the past and might therefore a little more measured.
dhx 5y ago
Why is this legislation needed if the Assistance and Access Act exists? Could the difference be a lack of cost recovery for individuals or businesses having to implement backdoors? The new legislation[1] inserts a section 64B "Person with knowledge of a computer or a computer system to assist disruption of data" which appears to be similar to the Assistance and Access Act, but doesn't appear to allow a telecommunications carrier, data centre owner, computer repair shop, DNS hosting provider, some random contractor that worked on a software project 10 years ago and is now retired and going fishing every day to recover costs of complying with an order to backdoor something or provide advice on how to backdoor it? [1] https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bills/r6623_aspassed/toc_pdf/20144b01.pdf;fileType=application%2Fpdf https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi...
- BLKNSLVR 5y ago
  The political necessity of a continual stream of headlines to give the appearance of 'doing something'. The ratcheting up of surveillance legislation whilst the opposition are absolutely impotent. There are no practical reasons for this that have anything to do improving life for Australian citizens as a whole.
- Youden 5y ago
  Because the Assistance and Access Act is widely misunderstood as doing things that it doesn't. The media drastically overreacted to that act, to the point where the Department of Home Affairs now has an entire page dedicated to addressing the false reporting [0]. The TL;DR is that the act doesn't allow the government to introduce mass surveillance. Section 317ZG [1] expressly forbids any law enforcement request from _having the effect_ of introducing any systemic vulnerability or weakness and _explicitly_ calls out new decryption capabilities as under that umbrella. The media's widespread report that e2e encryption was dead in Australia was therefore false. The purpose of the act was more like if Facebook or Google have data that are encrypted at rest and they hold the keys, they can be compelled to decrypt it. [0]: https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about-us/our-portfolios/national-security/lawful-access-telecommunications/myths-assistance-access-act https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about-us/our-portfolios/natio... [1]: http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ta1997214/s317zg.html http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ta1997...
chmod775 5y ago
Any scale is understood best if one can put forth examples for any part of the spectrum. Australia is actually fulfilling an important role here: Exemplifying a democracy just short of becoming a dystopian banana republic.
- CaptainBanger 5y ago
  Fossil Plutocracy
woodpanel 5y ago
Calm down. Citizens being forcibly kept from leaving the country has nothing to do with the Berlin Wall! Remember we're just talkng about disinformants. They're probably Russian assets anyways, or useless non-vaxxed scum. Everything is great down-under! > “Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!” (No one has the intention of erecting a wall!) Walter Ulbricht, State Council of the GDR, less than 2 months before they built the wall
pxi 5y ago
My money in the bank suddenly feels less secure. What are the odds this will cause a run on the banks (ah-la toilet paper) ?
noir_lord 5y ago
This is the mirror of what the UK passed a while back. Seems like free democracy is just a brand at this point.
AlgorithmicTime 5y ago
Australia is no longer a free country.
funnyThing7 5y ago
Why does this country still have the best alternative to big tech mail providers (Fastmail)? Maybe it doesn’t matter that much since email is open to the world anyway. I would like to vote with my wallet, but in the end I also want my mail to arrive without to much hassle. That means avoiding self-hosting and obscure providers..
ur-whale 5y ago
Australian people are simply being mentally prepared for the upcoming China takeover, when things such as this will be perceived as Really Not A Big Deal(tm) when compared to what standard Chinese practices are.
graderjs 5y ago
Laws on the book are always a few steps behind reality. So probably this was already occurring somehow on the sly or with lots of process, and this streamlines things. My concern is the ability to use this to 'plant' evidence on people by taking over their accounts, then using those accounts criminally and pretending the legitimate owner was the criminal actor, when in fact it was just someone abusing their LE powers.
bamboozled 5y ago
The Australian government , throughout history has always had an element of paranoia to it, which I remember learning in history comes from being surrounded by neighbours who for the majority aren’t of European decent (feeling vulnerable), and being geographically far from the motherlands who would protect her if war broke out. I think a lot of this fear remains to this day and drives a lot of these weirdo authoritarian, draconian policies. Australia is like a child without her mum, scared of the dark and unknown. Lastly the leader of the country is a religious fanatic who believes in all types of weird things. It’s a shame it’s going in the wrong direction for sure.
atok1 5y ago
Session is a "secure" messaging application designed in AU. Keep that in mind.
ezoe 5y ago
When Australia voted a law which force all nationals comply to the order of decryption, There was a half-joking, half-serious suggestion that is, whether it's safe for the OSS project to accept contribution from Australian. The chances are, he may be ordered by the Australian government to inject backdoor. If there exists a law for it, it will be used.
throwawaysea 5y ago
Between this and extreme authoritarianism relating to COVID, like killing shelter dogs to reduce human interactions (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/08/23/australia-dogs-killed-coronavirus/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/08/23/australia-do...) and aggressively suppressing protests (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/21/world/australia/melbourne-protests-covid-restrictions.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/21/world/australia/melbourne...), Australia seems like it has become a hostile mess. It’s very strange to me as an outsider because I didn’t send a cultural capacity for authoritarianism when I’ve visited, and instead sensed a pioneering attitude. Where’s the disconnect? And why doesn’t the government fear its citizenry more given it’s a democracy?

225 points by peterkelly 5y ago

Australia is a disaster when it comes to electronic freedoms. It might just be a lost cause at this point. A classic example of why you really shouldn't be giving the government too much power, because even so-called "modern democracies" can and will go bad. Backdoors in encryption, free for all to hack citizens, etc. What a mess. Hope some people fight back.

neonate 5y ago
Is it limited to Australia or can they just share whatever with the other 'Five Eyes'?
- corty 5y ago
  Of course they'll share it. First, non-citizens are usually even less protected than citizens. Second, secret services are also extralegal services as long as they can get away with it. Third, if they get caught, they won't be punished. German example: The BND has been caught spying on all Germans' communication (most probably still does so), as well as connections to foreign countries. They are only supposed to watch foreign countries. So they came up with a legal theory, called "Weltraumtheorie", where satellites are in space, so outside the jurisdiction of any state. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weltraumtheorie https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weltraumtheorie Later on, when this got out, it was just legalized and extended to fibre connections, because, well, that just replaces space, doesn't it?...
  - danuker 5y ago
    Doesn't this backfire? As in, you are free to commit wire fraud, because of this similarity to "international waters"?
    - corty 5y ago
      Theoretically. Practically, that legal theory is just a smokescreen for the willingness of the government to overlook any misdeeds by the secret services. Prosecutors and courts got the hint and didn't investigate any further. However, if you are a non-state-sponsored criminal, of course you will be prosecuted. "Qvod licet iovi, non licet bovi" is a very important legal principle ;) Also, later on, the government just legalized what the BND was doing, thereby invalidating any future attempt at prosecution for that past crime against the BND. Yet still maintaining the illegality for everyone else.
- ajkdhcb2 5y ago
  It is indeed opening doors for international cooperation: >"I think we've started to fill a void, a niche for the Americans to get around a few legal hurdles domestically" https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-10/nsw-operation-ironside-privacy-in-wake-of-afp-raids/100202924 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-10/nsw-operation-ironsid...
- xvector 5y ago
  Oh, it is definitely common for other countries to go through Australia to bypass laws or legal hurdles locally. This has been used to catch many cyber criminals.
m0zg 5y ago
Not just "electronic" freedoms anymore. They're currently locked down with the lockdown enforced by their own military from what I have seen. Serves them right, too, for giving up the last backstop on the government power: guns.
- pugio 5y ago
  You're conflating two very different things. The lockdowns are instituted at the state level, are different in every state, and are with the specific aim of (and in response to) preventing covid transmission. Adhering to a public health lockdown has nothing to do with Freedom, or lack of guns. By making a false comparison between the two, you are muddying any argument made against the electronic freedom restrictions.
  - logicchains 5y ago
    >Adhering to a public health lockdown has nothing can do with Freedom Regardless of what the justification given is, limiting people's freedom of movement and association is by definition a restriction of their freedom.
    - pugio 5y ago
      I apologize for my lack of clarity. I intended my capitalization of "Freedom" to stand in for a particular philosophy, which I did not clearly explicate. To restate: I think the COVID lockdowns are a very different case from these electronic restrictions, in scope, duration, reason, and advisability. A critique which cites both as similar examples of government overreach is missing its mark.
      - AussieWog93 5y ago
        I say this as a fellow Aussie who thinks both gun control and COVID lockdowns are good, sensible policies (although I'm starting to get sick of the latter): both of those things are absolutely limitations on freedom, even in the libertarian philosophical sense, and at least partly explains why Americans are so strongly against them. Freedom is about being able to do whatever the hell you want, so long as you don't restrict the freedom of others. It's not about being good or wise or socially responsible or even sane - it's just about nobody being able to stop you from doing whatever it is you want.
jay_kyburz 5y ago
It only takes one progressive government to roll it all back. Vote Green.
- l332mn 5y ago
  Care to give some examples of when this has happened?
  - vermilingua 5y ago
    It's never happened because Australians would never vote Green. Aside from having the public image as a bunch of hippies and crackpots, a huge chunk of our voter base just want to sit on their nest eggs, which the Libs (current govt.) promise to help with. Another huge chunk just vote how their parents vote. The only reason Australians (generalising) vote at all, is because we'd get fined if we didn't. With donkey votes (vandalised ballots) counted as votes for the current government, this country exists to hold the status quo.
    - AussieWog93 5y ago
      >With donkey votes (vandalised ballots) counted as votes for the current government That is completely untrue. Informal votes are not counted at all.
      - kwhitefoot 5y ago
        That's odd. In the UK spoiled ballots are quite definitely counted. "The number of Blank Votes and Spoiled Ballots are read out at the count, along with the results and are also included in subsequent reports. Your apathy towards the political parties will be heard not just forgotten." https://votingcounts.org.uk/spoilt-ballot https://votingcounts.org.uk/spoilt-ballot
        AussieWog93 5y ago
        My apologies, bad wording. They're counted here too - just not towards any particular political party.
einarfd 5y ago
> A classic example of why you really shouldn't be giving the government too much power, because even so-called "modern democracies" can and will go bad. I'm not an expert, but I'm under the impression that Australia uses a "first past the post" / "simple majority" voting system. If that is true, calling it a "modern democracy" seems deeply misguided, democracy yes, modern no.
- softveda 5y ago
  Not true at all. Australian federal election House of Representatives uses a preferential voting system where you have to number every candidate in your order of preference 1..N. Also voting (or at least attending) is compulsory.
- saithound 5y ago
  Not even close. The Australian electoral system uses instant-runoff for the House, and single-transferable-vote for the Senate.
  - Jensson 5y ago
    That has almost the same results as first past the post though.
    - SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
      Kinda, but that "almost the same" occasionally counts for some significant differences. Australian politics is dominated by the two major parties, but the minor parties form a reasonable percentage of held seats, and occasionally neither major party holds a majority, which leads to a hung parliament where the balance of power is open to negotiation. https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Senators/Senate_composition https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Senators/Senate_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_House_of_Representatives https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_House_of_Representa...
benjaminjt 5y ago
I wrote to my local federal "representative", just as I did with the Assistance and Access Act. I convinced others to contact theirs too. But even if we convince one politician that they should vote no, I strongly suspect they would vote with their party anyway. It just doesn't feel like representative democracy any more.

unknownOrigin 5y ago

Organized crime gangs... please. Look at what they're doing in relation to Covid. Crime gangs... Australia is nuts.

fighterpilot 5y ago
> Organized crime gangs Largely (albeit not completely) created by the state thanks to drug criminalization. For fuck's sake.
- bigiain 5y ago
  And don't forget the Big Blue Gang. Funded and empowered by the state, and totally unaccountable... “I have said before, if you write a ticket, and you get it wrong, I understand, and I won’t hold you to account for that. We have to shape the behaviour of people to get out of lockdown, and I know all of us want to be out of lockdown by Christmas, so please take the challenge.“ -- NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller, https://www.smh.com.au/national/police-commissioner-says-officers-wrongly-issuing-tickets-won-t-be-held-to-account-20210819-p58k76.html https://www.smh.com.au/national/police-commissioner-says-off...
fsflover 5y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalypse https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocal...

vermilingua 5y ago

The tech industry in Australia has for some time existed in an impossibly hostile climate, with onerous tasks to betray their own users able to be handed out to individuals at any time, with virtually no oversight. [1] This has all happened under the auspices of the most overtly corrupt and authoritarian government we’ve had in my lifetime, within four years. If I had the option, I’d pack up and move, but having written this and other anti-government sentiment, it’s entirely possible that they stop me at the border. [2] Combining this with the political apathy of nearly everyone here that I know, the current vilification of protestors (not entirely wrongly given the circumstances), and the utter spinelessness and complicity of the “opposition”, I don’t see a future for my country that doesn’t involve violent revolution (we’ve tried it before [3]) or tyranny. But it gets better: the tech industry is not only under attack, they’re complicit. Beyond even the ordinary run-of-the-mill scumbaggery we see from tech companies, a number have recently formed the Tech Council of Australia [4], aiming to make Australia a startup capital of the world. Scroll down that page and you’ll see a list of member corporations, several of which sent opposition to the AABill when consultation was open. Now, apparently, they’ve decided that it’s too hard to beat ‘em, so they’ll join ’em. [1] https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bills/r6195_aspassed/toc_pdf/18204b01.pdf;fileType=application%2Fpdf https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi... [2] https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/leaving-australia https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/leaving-australia [3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eureka_Rebellion https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eureka_Rebellion [4] https://techcouncil.com.au https://techcouncil.com.au

bjarneh 5y ago
> but having written this and other anti-government sentiment, it’s entirely possible that they stop me at the border. I've seen "Border Control Australia", and if leaving the country is anywhere near as difficult as entering it, you're in for a rough time. "Do you have dirt from another country under your shoes?" /s
- arcticbull 5y ago
  Reading the link, it appears that travel abroad is currently restricted due to COVID. Ordinarily, I don't believe Australia practices any meaningful exit controls beyond the usual: visa overstays, warrants. Certainly not capriciously based on your feelings regarding the current administration. In fact, I believe it's automated.

Lio 5y ago

What does this mean for the Australian tech industry? Should people be concerned about keeping commercial secrets in systems run Atlassian or Fastmail? The oversight here seems to just be one copper asking his mate to give him the nod to go on a fishing trip whenever he likes.

robertlagrant 5y ago
I think this is key. I wonder if Atlassian will release a statement.
- mikeyjk 5y ago
  Afaik they operate out of the US. I'm not sure if the NSA is really any better, perhaps just less forthright. I mean, I don't know what to believe, the whole FBI app.le thing makes me feel less cynnical about the chance of NSA knocking on the door in the name of national security - but I've heard they can do that, which seems like you'd have no choice. As a programmer from Australia though I can't believe they are passing these laws. Seriously depressing.

patchtopic 5y ago

As an Australian I am disgusted by these clowns who are in government.

CaptainBanger 5y ago
Mate, my only hope at this point is a Labor / Greens Coalition that makes it an election promise to aggressively target and rollback these laws.

LeoPanthera 5y ago

Fastmail is an Australian company and I would love to hear their response to this. Even though their servers are not located in Australia I bet that wouldn't slow the government down much.

Semaphor 5y ago
Their datacenters are in the US and they have always complied with legal requests. So this, like the backdoor law, doesn’t seem to change much. Both the US and AUS can access your e-mail if they just get a judge to sign a warrant (which, if Germany is any indication, is barely a hurdle).

simfoo 5y ago

As much as I love Fastmail, I think it's time to move elsewhere. I don't feel safe trusting a Australia based company with my online identity after all those hostile laws.

yosito 5y ago
While I understand the feeling, if you're emailing with anyone who doesn't use an encrypted provider (which is probably >99% of your email), state actors are easily capable of surveiling all of your email anyway, no matter what provider you use. Email isn't a secure form of communication. The advantage of a provider like Fastmail is that they're not profiling you based on your data like Google would do.
- antihero 5y ago
  But could, for instance, the Australian government compel Fastmail to hand over and hide a silent password reset email for any of my accounts, more easily than they could another provider?
  - yosito 5y ago
    Unless that password reset is sent in an encrypted email, it can easily be intercepted, no matter what your email provider is.
    - antihero 5y ago
      Is this done at an infrastructure level? IE, what level of access is need to just sniff up emails? Can anyone set up a relay or do you have to be a trusted entity?
- simfoo 5y ago
  I get your point. As a EU citizen though, I want to at least have a way to realistically fight a lawful intrusion after the fact. If I understand the Australian laws correctly, they are mostly enabling hidden surveillance. I'll be trying out https://mailbox.org/en https://mailbox.org/en as an alternative. They seem to have good PGP infra and are hosted in Germany.

make3 5y ago

can't close the subscription box on Firefox mobile, making the site unusable

circularfoyers 5y ago
I was able to close it on Firefox on Android, on both stable and nightly release channels.
mmahemoff 5y ago
Workaround - read it on Pocket (owned by Mozilla).
saladuh 5y ago
Same, on the fdroid build. I just put in an obviously, nonsensical email.

ponco 5y ago

Kick this mob out.

michaelmrose 5y ago

Could this force or encourage people to provide backdoors that could ultimately be used by parties outside of Australia to spy on people other than Australians?

fuckyouriotshit 5y ago
Why do you think the Five-Eyes agreement exists? This is exactly the sort "capability" that is designed to be used through the legal loophole of "you spy on our citizens and we'll spy on yours" which is the (realpolitik) basis of the Five-Eyes intelligence sharing agreement.

mantenpanther 5y ago

I always thought of Australia as an open and freedom loving country and planned to visit sometime. But what I'm reading in the (European) news the last months regarding all kinds of crackdowns on individual freedom sounds really bad and disturbing to me. Maybe it's just the news-providers here who report selectively, or are the Aussies really on board with this authoritarian direction of the government?

jlangenauer 5y ago
I'm from Australia, but live in Germany, and have been just horrified at what's happened back there. It's as though the country has lost its mind. My personal theory is that it's a manifestation of fear and insecurity. Australia, and many of its citizens have always had a certain lack of confidence, which is often covered up by bravado about being "the best country in the world" (as if there even is such a thing) and things like the tall poppy syndrome, currently often directed at expats("Too good to live in Australia, are you?") On top of this, a huge amount of fear has been manufactured over the Covid-19 pandemic, both by the media seeking clicks, and by politicians seeking electoral advantage. This is one of the most shameful aspects of the entire thing to me: the deliberate emotional abuse of the population. The contrast between Dan Andrew's daily fear-mongering and berating of "rule-breakers" and Angela Merkel, most of whose public statements during the pandemic were about reassuring the German people (with occasional expressions of "concern" at most when things were going badly) has been stark for me. Even Jactinta Ardern has been much more measured in her statements, although NZ wasn't immune from madness like banning the delivery of fiction books. And so, yes, I think a lot of Australians are on board with the border closures, the lockdowns and the like, which is astonishing to me, but I think the degree of fear there is what fundamentally explains it. As for government snooping, hardly anyone in Australia cares.
- mantenpanther 5y ago
  Using fear constantly is the most powerful tool to influence people, this became really clear to me the last 18 months. I hope politicians and media will get down to a more rational style of communicating, but I'm not too optimistic about it. Many countries experienced the dire consequences of a constant climate of fear in the past and might therefore a little more measured.

dhx 5y ago

Why is this legislation needed if the Assistance and Access Act exists? Could the difference be a lack of cost recovery for individuals or businesses having to implement backdoors? The new legislation[1] inserts a section 64B "Person with knowledge of a computer or a computer system to assist disruption of data" which appears to be similar to the Assistance and Access Act, but doesn't appear to allow a telecommunications carrier, data centre owner, computer repair shop, DNS hosting provider, some random contractor that worked on a software project 10 years ago and is now retired and going fishing every day to recover costs of complying with an order to backdoor something or provide advice on how to backdoor it? [1] https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bills/r6623_aspassed/toc_pdf/20144b01.pdf;fileType=application%2Fpdf https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi...

BLKNSLVR 5y ago
The political necessity of a continual stream of headlines to give the appearance of 'doing something'. The ratcheting up of surveillance legislation whilst the opposition are absolutely impotent. There are no practical reasons for this that have anything to do improving life for Australian citizens as a whole.
Youden 5y ago
Because the Assistance and Access Act is widely misunderstood as doing things that it doesn't. The media drastically overreacted to that act, to the point where the Department of Home Affairs now has an entire page dedicated to addressing the false reporting [0]. The TL;DR is that the act doesn't allow the government to introduce mass surveillance. Section 317ZG [1] expressly forbids any law enforcement request from _having the effect_ of introducing any systemic vulnerability or weakness and _explicitly_ calls out new decryption capabilities as under that umbrella. The media's widespread report that e2e encryption was dead in Australia was therefore false. The purpose of the act was more like if Facebook or Google have data that are encrypted at rest and they hold the keys, they can be compelled to decrypt it. [0]: https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about-us/our-portfolios/national-security/lawful-access-telecommunications/myths-assistance-access-act https://www.homeaffairs.gov.au/about-us/our-portfolios/natio... [1]: http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ta1997214/s317zg.html http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ta1997...

chmod775 5y ago

Any scale is understood best if one can put forth examples for any part of the spectrum. Australia is actually fulfilling an important role here: Exemplifying a democracy just short of becoming a dystopian banana republic.

CaptainBanger 5y ago
Fossil Plutocracy

woodpanel 5y ago

Calm down. Citizens being forcibly kept from leaving the country has nothing to do with the Berlin Wall! Remember we're just talkng about disinformants. They're probably Russian assets anyways, or useless non-vaxxed scum. Everything is great down-under! > “Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!” (No one has the intention of erecting a wall!) Walter Ulbricht, State Council of the GDR, less than 2 months before they built the wall

pxi 5y ago

My money in the bank suddenly feels less secure. What are the odds this will cause a run on the banks (ah-la toilet paper) ?

noir_lord 5y ago

This is the mirror of what the UK passed a while back. Seems like free democracy is just a brand at this point.

AlgorithmicTime 5y ago

Australia is no longer a free country.

funnyThing7 5y ago

Why does this country still have the best alternative to big tech mail providers (Fastmail)? Maybe it doesn’t matter that much since email is open to the world anyway. I would like to vote with my wallet, but in the end I also want my mail to arrive without to much hassle. That means avoiding self-hosting and obscure providers..

ur-whale 5y ago

Australian people are simply being mentally prepared for the upcoming China takeover, when things such as this will be perceived as Really Not A Big Deal(tm) when compared to what standard Chinese practices are.

graderjs 5y ago

Laws on the book are always a few steps behind reality. So probably this was already occurring somehow on the sly or with lots of process, and this streamlines things. My concern is the ability to use this to 'plant' evidence on people by taking over their accounts, then using those accounts criminally and pretending the legitimate owner was the criminal actor, when in fact it was just someone abusing their LE powers.

bamboozled 5y ago

The Australian government , throughout history has always had an element of paranoia to it, which I remember learning in history comes from being surrounded by neighbours who for the majority aren’t of European decent (feeling vulnerable), and being geographically far from the motherlands who would protect her if war broke out. I think a lot of this fear remains to this day and drives a lot of these weirdo authoritarian, draconian policies. Australia is like a child without her mum, scared of the dark and unknown. Lastly the leader of the country is a religious fanatic who believes in all types of weird things. It’s a shame it’s going in the wrong direction for sure.

atok1 5y ago

Session is a "secure" messaging application designed in AU. Keep that in mind.

ezoe 5y ago

When Australia voted a law which force all nationals comply to the order of decryption, There was a half-joking, half-serious suggestion that is, whether it's safe for the OSS project to accept contribution from Australian. The chances are, he may be ordered by the Australian government to inject backdoor. If there exists a law for it, it will be used.

throwawaysea 5y ago

Between this and extreme authoritarianism relating to COVID, like killing shelter dogs to reduce human interactions (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/08/23/australia-dogs-killed-coronavirus/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/08/23/australia-do...) and aggressively suppressing protests (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/21/world/australia/melbourne-protests-covid-restrictions.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/21/world/australia/melbourne...), Australia seems like it has become a hostile mess. It’s very strange to me as an outsider because I didn’t send a cultural capacity for authoritarianism when I’ve visited, and instead sensed a pioneering attitude. Where’s the disconnect? And why doesn’t the government fear its citizenry more given it’s a democracy?