
Australia’s Proposed Surveillance Laws Will Break the Trust Tech Depends On - DiabloD3
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/08/trust-us-were-secretly-working-foreign-government-how-australias-proposed-crypto
======
Intermernet
Apparently, this was overseen by the Department of Home Affairs. The recently
appointed PM of Australia (Scott Morrison) used to be the Minister for Home
Affairs. His new appointment to the role (Peter Dutton) was one of the primary
instigators in the recent power exchange (he actually wanted the top job for
himself, but lost the party vote).

Considering the history of both of these men, I predict a grim history for
Australia's privacy related laws. They're both staunchly pro-surveillance,
anti-immigration (to the point of racism) and, I suspect, _highly_ corrupt. I
know that last statement is accusative, but Peter Dutton is currently
embroiled in a situation where he released a French au pair and her partner
from immigration detention because (allegedly) her prospective employer's
second cousin lobbied the government to do so, and that family has donated
large amounts of funds to the party. Meanwhile, others are held in sub-human
conditions purely for trying to arrive in Australia as refugees, by boat. This
situation is unfolding right now, but I doubt there will be any fallout.

Australia's current leadership was not voted in by the population of the
country (as seems to be the trend for the last few years, no matter who you
voted for), and seems to be set on an anti-privacy, liberty-destroying,
nationalist agenda.

As an Australian, I'm incredibly embarrassed by all involved.

~~~
ajdlinux
Small correction: Morrison was not Minister for Home Affairs, he was Minister
for Immigration and Border Protection. Dutton was appointed Minister for Home
Affairs upon establishment of DHA at the end of 2017. Before the establishment
of DHA, which merged Immigration with other "national security" matters,
responsibility for general law enforcement matters, including the
telecommunications interception laws, the metadata retention scheme, and so
on, lay with the Attorney-General's Department, not the Department of
Immigration and Border Protection.

DHA is a portfolio that's more or less specifically designed to deliver policy
like this and frame everything in terms of "national security". Even the DHA
staff I personally know aren't fans of how the structure of the national
security bureaucracy has changed over the last year.

My bigger problem here is lack of pushback from the Opposition. The
"bipartisan consensus" on national security matters need not mean uncritical
acceptance of badly-designed laws and inhumane policies.

------
dane-pgp
All the more reason to speed up the deployment and implementation of Binary
Transparency:

[https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Binary_Transparency](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Binary_Transparency)

Even if this is only used to detect after-the-fact that an attack has
happened, that will still help us to assess the scale of the risks that
software users face, and maybe allow citizens to hold governments accountable
for how they use the dangerous powers they are seeking.

------
aldoushuxley001
Well that's dark. Unfortunately, I suspect Canada is not far from proposing a
similar bill. Currently the federal liberals are working on an Anti-Foreign
Interference bill that plans on clamping down on free speech in social media
in a very serious way. Scary times, authoritarianism sneaks in.

~~~
emptybits
Concerned Canadian here. You're referring to Bill C-76 (the "Anti-Foreign
Interference" and/or "Election Modernization Act")?

Is there a good critical analysis (WRT free speech) of this bill you can
recommend?

Text of bill is here:
[http://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/42-1/bill/C-76/first-
re...](http://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/42-1/bill/C-76/first-reading)

------
linuxftw
If only there was some theory of government that limited the government's
power.

Something that specifically granted powers to the government, and no other
powers, so we wouldn't have to worry about this kind of stuff in the future
when an ill-informed majority wants to make decisions for the rest of us.

~~~
lozenge
I'm not aware of one? Bureaucracies have their ways of squirming past any goal
you set. (See: patriot act, NSLs, FISA court, Anwar Al-Awlaki)

~~~
linuxftw
Indeed. This requires a lot of buy-in and a lot of voter accountability.

------
cascom
I was planning on moving over to fast mail over Labor Day, not so sure now.

~~~
Arubis
That’s an excellent point. I may not renew with them, and it has nothing to do
with FastMail themselves.

Australia seems like precisely the right-sized society to be affected by
pushback against this sort of behavior without being large enough to overwhelm
outside opposition.

~~~
Semaphor
So, what FastMail alternatives are there to be recommended?

~~~
philipov
Maybe ProtonMail?

~~~
Semaphor
It's a decent alternative, but the lack of FIDO 2FA is somewhat disappointing.

------
BLKNSLVR
1\. This feels like the beginnings of the inevitable and on-going battles for
power between technology-based multinationals and governments as foretold in
various dystopian sci-fi novels.

2\. Whilst all the issues in the article are cause for concern, what are the
practical, technical and legal limitations to these requests? As I stated in a
comment to a previous article, warrants are required for pursuing end-users
(don't know about companies), so that means it's not a willy-nilly application
of new powers.

It wouldn't be practical to pursue trivial crimes through forcing a company to
release an intentionally insecure app update that targets one person.

Having said that, however, the Australian Government has authorised warrants
to raid the homes of whistleblowers and their lawyers (see below), so I'm
probably underestimating the pettiness of the powerful.

3\. Further articles illustrating Australia's recent and worrying lurch
towards authoritarianism and nationalism:

[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/witness-k-and-
bernard-...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/witness-k-and-bernard-
collaery-charged-intelligence-act-breach/9919268)

[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-29/chelsea-manning-
austra...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-29/chelsea-manning-australian-
government-may-ban-entry/10180236)

[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-23/huawei-banned-from-
pro...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-23/huawei-banned-from-
providing-5g-mobile-technology-australia/10155438)

First they helped to liberate East Timor and I said "good onya, mate", then
they tried to screw billions of dollars from East Timor by illegally planting
listening devices in the offices of the East Timorese government and I said
"whoa, hang on a sec, that's Unaustralian! That's not why we helped them
achieve independence in the first place is it? You sly c*nts!", then they came
for my private messages...

------
marcus_holmes
Always find it amazing how strong the urge to authoritarianism is in
Australia. You'd think we'd all be larrikins and chilled out on the beach
inviting newcomers to the barbie.

But no, we're apparently terrified of immigrants and love nothing more than
the smack of firm leadership.

~~~
dfsegoat
Just to support your point: The govt. also decided to seize everyone's
firearms in 1996.

~~~
bigkm
Most of Australia was fine with this.

~~~
ajdlinux
As an Australian, who has many issues with these surveillance laws, I'm also
100% behind our gun control.

~~~
malnourish
I'm an outsider that feels the same. I could never move to Australia due to
its stances on privacy and censorship but the gun control is an attraction.

~~~
shard972
Just so you know, if you want a gun here it's not rocket science. Go to a gun
club, watch a fire guns being fired, go do a test and buy a safe.

Congrats, you can now buy rifles and shotguns.

There was a recent case of a father who was rejected from 3 gun clubs because
he was too shifty and yet the 4th accepted him and the cops didn't see any
reason to reject him. He bought a rifle and shot both his teenage kids at his
x-wife's house.

Also you just have to pickup the weekly papers to see cops are afraid of the
rising gang violence and the amount of illegal guns that they are finding and
being used.

But airsoft guns are illegal so i feel so much safer than countries like NZ
that let you buy AR-15s /s

------
elitistphoenix
Typical government. Scream terrorists and paedophiles and try and erode
people's freedom even more because no one can disagree /s

~~~
Guthur
Why the sarcasm?

I suppose it's not that you can't disagree it's just that apathy means many
won't and walk heard first into a Soviet/east german stasi society. This is
even the stuff of fiction we have recent history to look upon. But it's all
for the greater good, right? Born of compassion and a desire to protect
surely?

~~~
Ntrails
> apathy means many won't and walk heard first into a Soviet/east german stasi
> society.

It could be apathy, or it could be that they genuinely believe the government
is doing the right thing. Don't discount the latter because the former is
easier for your worldview

------
dbg31415
In related news...

* 1,464 Western Australian government officials used ‘Password123’ as their password. Cool, cool. - The Washington Post || [https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/08/22/western...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/08/22/western-australian-government-officials-used-password-their-password-cool-cool/)

~~~
adiusmus
The P is capitalised. What more security do you need?

These are the same people that want all Australians to move their health
records online and made it manual opt-out. Amongst every other system uses old
methods. The tax system doesn’t use 2FA.

At least the credit cards use a chip and PIN... oh wait, now on contactless
payment.

------
tobyhinloopen
I Also Like Capital Letters For Every Word

