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Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
41–50 of 71 posts
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#42If you're wondering why this kind of thing happens all the time in Australia, the late Donald Horne summed it up beautifully in the 1960s: "Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck" [1] Australia has many intelligent, brilliant people. For some reason, the design of our political system results in almost none of them getting into Government. This awful, fundamentally flawed law…
From a selfish American-centric perspective, sometimes it feels like different west-aligned countries/regions use these attempts as test beds to gauge acceptableness in other countries/regions.
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#43See also https://old.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/a3kk7u/austral... https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislat... and for a laugh at the sad state of affairs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW-OMR-iWOE
Interesting comment on that thread. Since all Australian SSL certs are now compromised (we must assume that), shouldn't all Australian certifying authorities be de-trusted?
There are none. https://ccadb-public.secure.force.com/mozilla/IncludedCACert...
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#44This is based on a false premise, that the Govt will ask developers , and that they would care if it is difficult/infeasible/impossible to actually complete. In reality, they issue a notice to the company, give them a timeframe, and expect it to be done. They don’t care about the intricacies of git.
You're "reality" doesn't match the historical record how FVEY agencies work. Programs like the NSA's BULLRUN[1] or GCHQ's EDGEHILL are well funded ($B/yr) target individuals, companies, standards committees[2], and anything else that serves the purpose of preventing or compromising encryption.
One well documented[2] example where individuals were "tasked" (spy on) directly is the compromise of satellite ISP Stellar:
> The document lists "key staff" at the company. The document states they should be identified and "tasked." "Tasking" somebody in signals intelligence jargon means that they are to be targeted for surveillance. In addition to CEO Christian Steffen, nine other employees are named in the document.
The shock on the IT chief's face[4] when he saw his name in an NSA document...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullrun_%28decryption_program%...
[2] https://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg12...
[3] http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/snowden-documents-...
[4] http://www.spiegel.de/video/chokepoint-the-moment-stellar-le...
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#45As an Australian Dev living in the U.K. this is absolutely terrifying. I'm compelled to somehow deploy a backdoor at whatever company I'm working for if they have a single Australian user on threat of jail time???
You are not bound to the laws of Australia in the UK. Foreign nationals in Australia are. That being said, this is coming to the UK too.
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
> other Five Eyes members will undoubtedly adopt similar laws soon, if they haven't already Exactly. For those getting wound up over this in other western countries - Australia is often used as a testing ground for this kind of legislation. It will be your country next.
> Australia is often used as a testing ground for this kind of legislation. I didn't know that. Can you mention any notable examples?
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#47If you're wondering why this kind of thing happens all the time in Australia, the late Donald Horne summed it up beautifully in the 1960s: "Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck" [1] Australia has many intelligent, brilliant people. For some reason, the design of our political system results in almost none of them getting into Government. This awful, fundamentally flawed law…
From a selfish American-centric perspective, sometimes it feels like different west-aligned countries/regions use these attempts as test beds to gauge acceptableness in other countries/regions.
I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas.
After Snowden I had a couple people I barely knew comment to me something like I should "stop there from being more Snowdens" as a software developer, since they saw it in very simplistic terms as "my country = good, this guy = sabotaging my country" but I didn't run into anyone offline who shared the privacy-conscious reaction with me.
I think that explains why these things pop up everywhere much more simply. And without changing that perception, the other battles seem like losing fights.
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
From a selfish American-centric perspective, sometimes it feels like different west-aligned countries/regions use these attempts as test beds to gauge acceptableness in other countries/regions.
I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas. After Snowden I had a couple people I barely knew comment to me something like I should "stop there from being more Snowdens" as a software developer, since they saw it in very simplistic terms as "my country = good, this guy = sabotaging my country" but I didn't run into anyone offline who shared the p…
> I worry "grand conspiracy" views distract from the problem of public opinion often being in favor of the bad ideas.
The cynic in me is not concerned because I feel public opinion can be swayed and/or the issue is not the biggest/most-important issue in representative democracies. I admit being overly cynical on the importance of public opinion and therefore my disagreement efforts manifest more in counteracting technologies than politicking (and even then, the efforts are little and of limited consequence).
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#49It seems like a work-around for an Australian company would be to always have a non-Australian employee have final say in what's deployed to production.
Now you have to fire him to deploy the backdoor. I expect the law doesn't require you to fire people. Even if it does, he or she is not bound by the gag order and could be a canary to the rest of the world.
Re: Commandeering Australian citizens to become spies
#50Isn't this the exact thing that China has in law that is causing everyone to dump Huawei over?
This is probably the reason they want to dump Huawei. Much easier to subvert technology produced locally or in allied countries (and the other Five Eyes members will undoubtedly adopt similar laws soon, if they haven't already).
It's the cypherpunk future I've always dreamed of.