Forcing private companies to become mass surveillance hubsThe Australian government is pushing to implement a ”surveillance tax” on the people of the country in order to pay for a mandate that would see communications companies retaining data on customers for two years.
In a disturbing development that should serve as a warning to Americans, the Australian Attorney-General admitted that the surveillance system is ”under active consideration by the government”.
The Age reports that communications companies believe the compulsory scheme will cost between $500 million to $700 million a year, a cost that will be passed on to the people.
”We’re concerned about the lack of oversight on how this scheme might operate and there are also significant privacy concerns,” said Teresa Corbin, CEO of Australian Consumer Communications Action Network.
Other telco officials estimate that the “surveillance tax” will mean a rise in costs of $5 to $10 extra a month.
Steve Dalby, chief regulatory officer at iiNet testified at a Senate hearing this week that the Attorney-General’s Department considers the ”metadata” that is to be retained to include not only telephone records, but also internet access, email and internet telephony.
The communication data is said to encompass indicators of time, location, sender and receiver, as well as URLs and IP addresses.
It’s essentially the same information that the NSA has been siphoning from Americans’ communications for years, as revealed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.
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