wraggster
August 11th, 2012, 17:58
Australian Attorney-General Nicola Roxon has been forced to back down on her government's unpopular plan to force ISPs to store the web history (http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/roxon-puts-web-surveillance-plans-on-ice-20120809-23x9l.html) and social networking (http://www.itnews.com.au/News/308218,govt-mulls-cloud-social-intercepts.aspx) of all Australians for two years. The plan has been deeply unpopular with the public (http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/data-trail-easy-to-follow-for-big-brother-20120720-22ffm.html), with hackers attacking the government's spy agency (http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/security-it/hackers-cripple-asio-site-to-protest-web-spy-plan-20120810-23ycj.html). Public servants at the spy agency promoting the scheme been scathing of the government, saying: 'These reforms are urgently needed to deal with a rapidly evolving security environment, but there isn't much appetite within the government for anything that attracts controversy,' but a document on the scheme released under the Freedom of Information Act had 90% of it redacted to prevent "premature unnecessary debate." (http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/no-minister-90-of-web-snoop-document-censored-to-stop--premature-unnecessary-debate-20100722-10mxo.html) Roxon hasn't dropped the unpopular scheme entirely, but only delayed it until after the next election (http://www.itnews.com.au/News/311506,roxon-reportedly-pushes-back-data-retention-law.aspx)."