[AusNOG] Assistance and Access Bill moves to PJCIS

[Reuben Farrelly]

On 5/12/2018 8:33 am, Nick Stallman wrote:
> Also does this mean that the custom firmware for one or a handful of 
> targets is not a systemic weakness, but if (when) the custom firmware 
> leaks out publicly and can be used criminally, it suddenly does become a 
> systemic weakness?

I wonder how this is all going to play out with license compliance of 
the GPL and other similar licenses, especially if there is talk about 
covertly modifying code or systems.

Are these Government organisations also going to be also inherently 
violating (or forcing other parties to violate) the license terms of the 
GPL if they prohibit distribution of their modified and now vulnerable 
source code?

If a company is instructed by law enforcement to insert a backdoor into 
an authors' code but not be permitted to distribute the source for the 
backdoor along with the original source code, will the author be able to 
sue the company under copyright law?

Does the Australian Government think they are going to be able to 
encourage the likes of Lineage or a budget overseas tablet manufacturer 
to assist in providing private code for law enforcement purposes?

I'm sure most politicians have already considered the licensing aspects 
of this though, so perhaps I need not worry.  Perhaps the law of 
Australia will now trump the law of International Software Licenses too, 
in much the same way it trumps the laws of mathematics.