[AusNOG] News: Telstra to clamp down on peer-to-peer

[Mark Newton]

On Wed, Feb 06, 2013 at 11:15:05PM +1100, Phillip Grasso wrote:

 > Its their network and cost dynamic they should manage how they see fit; so
 > long as they aren't blocking or going against net neutrality.

Or other more local concerns.

There have been a few cases of late where it seems to me that
various interests have been skating very close to the meaning
of section 6 of the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) 
Act.

Considering the broadness of the definition in that clause 
("... listening to or recording, by any means..."), how far down
the rabbit hole do we have to go before an automated system which 
inspects packet payload is considered to be "any means"?

The usual weasely response is that whoever is screwing around
with the public's traffic inevitably claims that they're only
capturing metadata rather than content, but DPI gear is specifically
designed to look at content so we've now moved past that point.

It seems to me that if an Australian telco employed teams of staff
to wiretap phone lines to listen to PSTN calls to glean intelligence
which they could secretly exploint for their commercial advantage,
people would go to jail.

But if they deploy a piece of equipment which essentially automates
the same thing on a massive scale, that's totally okay.

I don't think the "network protection duties" clause in sec 7
applies.  What other "outs" would a carrier have to enable them to
legally automate telecommunications interception? Does Telstra's
blog post satisfy the "without the knowledge" clause in sec 6(1)?

The AFP doesn't seem remotely interested in investigating institutional
breaches of that particular law even though it's a Commonwealth offence
carrying a term of imprisonment of up to two years.

So a wider question becomes, what is the point of the Parliament
setting limits on interception if the limits have no practical 
effect?

Funny ol' world.

  - mark