No Minister: 90% of web snoop document censored to stop 'premature unnecessary debate

[David Bird]

The federal government has censored approximately 90 per cent of a secret document outlining its controversial plans to snoop on Australians' web surfing, obtained under freedom of information (FoI) laws, out of fear it could cause "premature unnecessary debate".

The government has been consulting with the internet industry over the proposal, which would require ISPs to store certain internet activities of all Australians - regardless of whether they have been suspected of wrongdoing - for law enforcement agencies to access.

All parties to the consultations have been sworn to secrecy.

Attorney-General Robert McClelland and part of the censored document.

Brisbane Times

[David Bird]

Greens communications spokesperson Senator Scott Ludlam described the decision by the Federal Attorney-General's Department to black out the majority of its response to a freedom of information request as "extraordinary". The request was for information on the government's controversial data retention proposal, known as "OzLog".

The department is examining the European Directive on Data Retention to consider whether it would be beneficial for Australia to adopt a similar regime. The directive requires telcos to record data such as the source, destination and timing of all emails and telephone calls (including internet telephones). However, sources have said that the policy could extend as far as tracking the web browsing history of all Australians — a claim the office of Attorney-General Robert McClelland has denied.

However, the Sydney Morning Herald this afternoon published the results of a Freedom of Information request sent to the department on the matter, with most of the document blacked out. In a separate letter, departmental official Claudia Hernandez wrote that the sections had been blacked out because it could lead to "premature unnecessary debate" and that in addition, she considered that its release would be "contrary to the public interest".

ZDNet Australia