Print 49 comment(s) - last by Autisticgramma.. on Oct 4 at 2:50 PM

Country claims Orwellian measures are necessary to fight "white collar crime"

Steve Dalby has a big problem.  As the chief regulatory officer at Australian internet service provider iiNet Ltd. (ASX:IIN), he tells the Sydney Morning Herald that his company is struggling sustain the $3M USD a month service the government is demanding to spy on its citizens.

I. Orwellian Plan Could Cost Telecoms $3M USD a Month

Other service providers like Telstra Comp., Ltd. (ASX:TLS) are flat-out refusing to comply saying the government order to spy on everything from a user's Google Inc. (GOOG) searches to storing the numbers involved in their encrypted payments via eBay, Inc.'s (EBAY) PayPal is not only a gross invasion of privacy -- it's also likely illegal.

Security director Darren Kane told the SMH, "We cannot capture or provide any metadata or any content around something like Gmail because it is Google-owned, it is offshore and it is over the top of our network.  The real value of what we might have in a data retention scheme would be greatly diminished as soon as the organised criminals and potential terrorists knew that we were not capturing that data."

big brother is watching
Australia wants to "watch" its citizens' every digital communications. [Image Source: DeviantArt]

But that's precisely what the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) wants access to full access to all user metadata, including usernames and passwords.  It also wants to intercept and store copies of citizens' emails, social media chats, and text messages.

ASIC officials claim that handing ubiquitous spy powers to government regulators will help the ASIC fight "white collar crime".  But collecting the information may actually create criminal opportunity, as Telstra points out.  And industry officials suggest that the plan could cost up to $400M USD to put in place, plus potentially tens, if not hundreds of millions a month to maintain a full watch over users' data.

II. U.S. Presidential Candidates are Eyeing Similar Efforts

Australia is a pretty punitive nation when it comes to internet law enforcement, having been among the few to contemplate a "strikes" plan to disconnect users' internet.  But it's far from alone.  The Obama and Bush administrations both worked to bolster frameworks to allow non-transparentwarrantlessubiquitous spying.  This is unlikely to change as both the current President and Republican nominee Mitt Romney have defending domestic spying.


Much like Australia, the U.S. is currently considering heaping a plan to sever "frequent" pirates' internet on top of the growing framework of non-transparent, warrantless surveillance methods.

In both nations the big pushback is coming from interne service providers and internet software service providers like Google.

Source: Sydney Morning Herald

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RE: hah
By knutjb on 9/30/2012 5:13:16 PM , Rating: 2
Go seek professional help, quickly.

