The government’s much-vaunted new “Cyber Security Centre” will have no legislation, no central leadership and no money. But it will have “unclassified areas”.
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Follow Crikey’s latest coverage of ASIO. Crikey’s ASIO coverage includes independent news, blogs and commentary.
Danby and Sheridan hammer home an own-goal for data retention
A national security committee member’s poor judgment has inflicted serious damage on the push for data retention by Australia’s security agencies.
READ MOREZygier scandal: the journo in a deadly game of spy v spy
Not much is known about how Australian Ben Zygier ended up dead in a cell in Israel. But some of what we do know comes from a Fairfax journo unwittingly entangled in the spy scandal, writes Tom Hyland.
READ MORE‘Banality of evil’: new documents lift the veil on data retention
New documents shed light on the enthusiasm of the Attorney-General’s Department to move forward with (and think large on) data retention, and the resistance it encountered from industry.
READ MOREFarewell to McClelland, a ministerial cipher for the security state
Robert McClelland’s time as attorney-general were lost years representing how Labor has been co-opted by the security establishment. Farewell.
READ MORETips and rumours
Price rise for SMH paper editions. Circulation is falling, the paper will halve in (physical) size next month, but readers of The Sydney Morning Herald will have to pay more for their daily edition. While Fairfax isn’t talking, we hear a cover price rise is on the cards over the next fortnight. The Monday-Friday paper […]
READ MORERoxon clarifies draconian data retention plans
The Attorney-General has responded to growing complaints about the ill-defined nature of the data retention proposals currently being considered by the Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.
READ MOREHypothetical: news from a national security future
We already know what could happen if proposals to dramatically extend surveillance and intelligence-gathering powers are allowed to proceed.
READ MOREMenzies, martinis and minimal accountability: ASIS boss speaks
The first speech by a head of ASIS, delivered yesterday by Nick Warner, is welcome, but told us little.
READ MOREWhy has the Right gone missing on the surveillance state?
When Labor finally unveils a genuine threat to civil rights, its usual critics have fallen silent. Why?
READ MOREGovernment unveils huge wishlist of new surveillance powers
A major parliamentary inquiry will examine government proposals to significantly extend surveillance powers — including to Twitter and other social media.
READ MOREWar on privacy: committee sends Roxon back to drawing board
Nicola Roxon’s efforts to establish a process for expanding national security powers has suffered a hiccup, with the powerful Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security asking her to redraft it.
READ MOREBits and bobs tucked away in the budget
SBS is a big winner, ABX will receive $5 million to switch and upgrade regional radio services and commercial television broadcasters will get yet another government handout.
READ MOREBusy times in national security as the DHS comes to town
The government has moved to expand national security powers as we integrate further into America’s War on Terror.
READ MOREAll’s well in an intelligence community overseeing itself
A new “independent” review of the intelligence community by one of its chief architects surprisingly finds all is well.
READ MORECivil liberties groups to A-G: ASIO refugee assessments unjust
An open letter to the Attorney-General Nicola Rox, calling on here to implement legislative change to ensue adverse ASIO security assessments can be meaningfully challenged.
READ MOREHow ASIO’s non-existent war on illegal fishing is faring
ASIO’s powers were expanded earlier this year, we were told, to help combat illegal fishing. So this week ASIO was asked how the war on illegal fishing was faring …
READ MOREDavid Irvine: a colourful senior spook
The man most responsible for protecting Australia from a terrorist attack is not your typically dour spook. ASIO’s David Irvine holds an honours degree in Elizabethan history, writes Matthew Knott.
READ MOREMore hyping of the threat of ‘cyber’
Cyber warfare continues to be spruiked by governments as a major threat. Pity they fail to explain where the threat really lies.
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WikiLeaks and disclosing classified
information
Julian Assange may face prosecution for revealing the identity of an ASIO officer. But governments disclose secret things all the time.
READ MOREDigital Pearl Harbors make for a good year for the cyber defence industry
Cyber Pearl Harbors and digital Blackwaters mean the cyber defence industry is on the cusp of a boom.
READ MOREHow the media will react to a right to privacy
Belatedly, the government is acting on a longstanding recommendation about a right to privacy. But it’s a little hypocritical.
READ MOREASIO gets its new powers — and no one will tell us why
Labor and the Coalition combined to give ASIO new powers last night. We still don’t know why.
READ MOREASIO: fishers of men
The Attorney-General’s department, struggling to explain why ASIO needs wider powers, chooses the fish.
READ MOREUncover Australia’s secret history
Filmmaker Haydn Keenan has spent the past five years pouring through secret files that ASIO kept on potential enemies of the state in the 1960s and 1970s. The result is a fascinating exhibition of files in Sydney, writes Kate Horowitz.
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