[bad_user]

EDIT: note that I'm probably wrong, see reply below by @brongondwana!

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One problem not being addressed is that via #AABill data access requests can now be submitting without warrants issued by a judge, so it removes the judicial oversight.

Also this law says that all such requests need to be "reasonable", but it doesn't define what that means. For example is blanket surveillance reasonable? AFAIK this law doesn't say. And companies like FastMail cannot report abuse publicly, or the people responsible risk 10 years in jail.

Couple this with the fact that Australia is part of the "Five Eyes", being the only country without a "Bill of Rights", it means that agencies like the NSA could use Australia for their dirty work.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't read the actual bill, just random commentary on the net.

I'm a FastMail customer, but reading this blog article is leaving me worried, because FastMail keeps mentioning "lawful warrants", but from what I've read warrants aren't needed anymore.

It's pretty sad. I've seen many Australian software companies doing a good job, like FastMail here and their reputation is now tarnished due to incompetent politicians. The wave of populism and stupidity has been spreading.

[brongondwana]

We've never done blanket surveillance, and specifically mention "individual users" in the blog post. There's been a lot of FUD about warrants not being needed - I think the ZDNet article we linked covers that very well:

"[a judge doesn't have to sign off on the specific method by which data is requested] However there must be an underlying warrant to access communications under the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act or the Surveillance Devices Act or state-level equivalents."

So the request still requires a warrant that specifies which communications are to be intercepted, but not a warrant that specifies how the interception is to be performed.

Sadly, random commentary on the net does tarnish reputations every bit as well as facts :(

[cyphar]

> There's been a lot of FUD about warrants not being needed - I think the ZDNet article we linked covers that very well

There is definitely a lot of FUD, though I think the ZDNet article is underplaying several quite reasonable concerns about the legislation.

In addition, I've not seen any concrete explanation of how you could make use of the Commonwealth Ombudsman to effectively appeal the decision of assessors for a TCN.

[bad_user]

Thanks for the clarifications.

You might want to update the article, to make it clear that warrants are still needed.

Also keep up the good work and I hope #AABill doesn't hurt your business.

[cyphar]

> One problem not being addressed is that via #AABill data access requests can now be submitting without warrants issued by a judge, so it removes the judicial oversight.

TANs require a warrant (or rather, a TAN is unenforceable if it would require the agency to get a warrant -- but a TAN instead is a method to give force to a warrant). The restrictions on notices are in s317ZH (which is a while after the definitions of the notices so people might be forgiven for misunderstanding the limitations).

> And companies like FastMail cannot report abuse publicly, or the people responsible risk 10 years in jail.

5 years in gaol is the limit. There are also processes for them to provide statistical information about how many notices they've received, as well as provisions for courts and the Commonwealth Ombudsman to make public notice information.

> Couple this with the fact that Australia is part of the "Five Eyes", being the only country without a "Bill of Rights", it means that agencies like the NSA could use Australia for their dirty work.

This is definitely true, and GCHQ has already started requesting similar powers in the UK (not that they need to, since they can just use the Australian powers). There are several provisions in the act which specify that it can be used for investigations into "serious foreign crimes".

> Please correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't read the actual bill, just random commentary on the net.

I would recommend reading it, a lot of people haven't.