[AusNOG] PJCIS report on data retention bill has been posted

[Paul Wilkins]

*The Government is resuming debate on this Bill on Tuesday. Do you think
they’re going to spend the weekend assembling a package of amendments to
give effect to PJCIS’s recommendations, when they already have what they
want?*
To be honest, I wish I knew what they want. There never has been a set of
requirements for the legislation, or any cost benefit analysis. The best
one can do is guess as to the objectives:

 - state security, anti terrorism, anti organised crime
These are serious players, and won't be caught from metadata. The crazies
who have committed attrocities were already known to authorities, so it's
not clear where data retention helps.

 - pedophiles
Data retention may catch marginally more pedophiles than current policing
efforts. But it won't justify the expense of data retention.

 - illegal downloaders
Data retention is going to mean downloaders move to encryption. So
ironically, complicating the efforts of the security agencies.

 - policing antisocial behaviour on the internet - harassment, hate speech,
revenge pornography
Here data retention will actually work, and allow identification of people
using the internet to be anti social. This may even be the actual purpose
of the legislation, which the government (and police forces) are reluctant
to admit, given that it gives the police considerable powers to impinge on
free speech. In a properly functioning society, it's not the police that
determine the limits of free speech. Certainly the public would be
surprised to learn the government plans to have consumers spend some  $600M
in infrastructure to police speech on the internet. If this is the real
intent, hardly surprising no one is saying so.

Otherwise, I really have no idea what they hope to achieve with this
legislation. It will be expensive and will deliver scant benefits, and
ironically will undermine national security.

Paul Wilkins




On 27 February 2015 at 18:16, Mark Newton <newton at atdot.dotat.org> wrote:

> On 27 Feb 2015, at 5:44 pm, Paul Wilkins <paulwilkins369 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Terms of Reference
> > The section 'Terms of Reference' makes no mention of scope. So perhaps
> the PJCIS is of the view they can make whatsoever recommendations they see
> fit. But it is a mistake to consider the PJCIS has carte blanche, where
> their May 2013 Terms of Reference limit enquiry to the following:
>
> PJCIS has the opposite of carte blanche. The government of the day can
> (and likely will) ignore everything they say. It does not matter what the
> recommendations say, or even if any specific recommendation counts as a
> “major concession,” if it’s never enacted into law.
>
> The Government is resuming debate on this Bill on Tuesday. Do you think
> they’re going to spend the weekend assembling a package of amendments to
> give effect to PJCIS’s recommendations, when they already have what they
> want?
>
>
>   - mark
>
>
>
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