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George Brandis, Australia's Attorney General, is inviting submissions on the possible expansion of access to metadata retained under Australia's telco metadata retention laws. Under existing law, telcos are required to retain metadata for two years, which may be used for law enforcement and national security purposes.
However, the committee also indicated that it was aware of the potential for unintended consequences resulting from a prohibition on courts authorising access to data retained under the scheme and recommended that the Minister for Communications and the Attorney-General review this measure.
Rupert's empire published on this last year, the ABC was late to the party with a story on January 5. I wonder if the AG and the communications minster are aware of the potential for unintended consequences resulting from civil access to this metadata.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bradley13 on Friday January 06 2017, @08:36AM
I find laws like this to be just astounding invasions of privacy. This metadata represents your movement in cyberspace. Imagine requiring every citizen to wear a tracker that records all of their physical movements, and store this for future use "just in case".
Sure, it's a handy investigative tool, but at what price in privacy and individual freedom? Moreover, what "crimes" will be discovered that will put innocent people in jail? Your WLAN was hacked in a drive-by incident, and used for something illegal? Prove it wasn't you!
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by zeigerpuppy on Friday January 06 2017, @10:06AM
It's called a mobile phone and you probably already carry one friend.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 07 2017, @02:02AM
No, I don't. Fuck off. Mobile phones are also voluntary.