Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Government Services and the Digital Economy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Information Disclosure, National Interest and Other Measures) Bill 2022. Access to a person's mobile phone location data, known as triangulation, can mean the difference between life and death. Last year, according to the Australian Federal Police National Missing Persons Coordination Centre, more than 53,000 people were reported missing—about 145 a day. In many of these cases law enforcement and emergency services agencies turn to the telecommunications carriers for vital mobile phone location data. With more than 20 million Australians estimated to own a mobile phone, location data can and does save lives.

While the telcos cannot provide precise GPS data or exact coordinates, they are able to provide approximate location information, based on triangulation of a mobile phone relative to mobile transmission towers. The quality of this information is now considerably better than it was thanks to the introduction of advanced mobile location under the previous coalition government, as I will return to. The data cannot be used to verify exactly where a person was at a particular time, but it can establish—sometimes to quite a degree of precision—the location where a person may have gone missing. This is critical information for police or emergency services personnel when searching for a person who has been reported missing or who is at risk of harm.

Part 13 of the Telecommunications Act sets out strict rules for telecommunications carriers, carriage service providers and others in their use and disclosure of personal information. Currently under section 287 of the act, telecommunications companies can only help to triangulate a missing person if a threat to a person's life or health is 'serious and imminent'. The bill would remove the word 'imminent' making it easier for law enforcement agencies and emergency services organisations to access triangulation information. While removing the word 'imminent', the bill adds an important safeguard which is that the entity or person being asked to disclose the information needs to be satisfied that 'it is unreasonable or impracticable to obtain the other person's consent to the proposed disclosure or use.'

A recommendation was made in 2008 to the then Labor government by the Australian Law Reform Commission—in a report entitled Foryour information: Australian privacy law and practice (ALRC Report 108) and tabled in August 2008—that the requirement that a threat be imminent was inappropriate. At that time, the Australian Law Reform Commission recommended 'imminent' be repealed, expressing the view that any analysis of whether a threat is serious must involve consideration of the gravity of the potential outcome as well as the relative likelihood. While most recommendations from this report were adopted, the then Labor government decided not to implement that recommendation. The intention of the bill before the House now, as the Minister for Communications stated in her second reading speech, is that it is targeted not only to improve the operation and transparency of the relationship between law enforcement and the telcos but also, crucially, to save lives. In view of the importance of saving lives, it is regrettable that the then Labor government did not take action at the time.

It is regrettable that this recommendation lay dormant until the urgent need for law reform was raised by the New South Wales deputy state coroner in a letter to the Minister for Communications in October 2022. This followed a coronial inquest into the sad disappearance of a New South Wales resident, which found that law enforcement agencies could not characterise the threat to life and health as 'imminent', meaning no location data could be accessed, which it is feared contributed to the loss of a life. In the minister's second reading speech she referenced a 2020 New South Wales coronial inquest into the death of a man which raised similar concerns. However, my colleague the shadow minister for communications, Senator Henderson, sought information in a briefing from the department of communications as to whether there had been any correspondence sent by the coroner at the time to the Commonwealth government requesting such an amendment to the act, and she was advised that there was no such correspondence sent.

It is important to point out that, as reported by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, some 25,410 disclosures of personal information were made by the telcos in the last financial year for the purpose of averting a threat to a person's life or health. This bill contains other measures to support public safety by permitting the use and disclosure of unlisted numbers stored within the Integrated Public Number Database, or IPND, which a database of all Australian phone numbers and associated names and addresses. Currently, the IPND manager is prevented under the act from providing a triple 0 emergency service with a name and address of a caller from an unlisted number. Given that 95 per cent of the 72 million mobile phone numbers in Australia are unlisted, and that mobile phone numbers are unlisted by default, this does present a significant barrier to providing life-saving help when a caller is unable to provide details of their location. Allowing triple 0 services to access unlisted phone number information will save lives. The bill also clarifies a number of other matters, including that telecommunications companies, when providing reasonable and necessary assistance to emergency services organisations, are not liable for damages when acting in good faith.

The bill builds on important work by the former coalition government, which rolled out advanced mobile location—or AML—technology, which is built into the operating systems of both Apple and Android telephones. This provides greater location accuracy to triple 0 services during an emergency call from a mobile telephone. Following extensive work by the previous government over many months, AML became available to Australians calling triple 0 from a mobile phone in December 2020. By August 2021, the rollout was complete across all states and territories. AML has already been used to save lives. For example, in South Australia the technology helped emergency services locate two kayakers caught in strong winds three kilometres offshore, which eliminated the need for an expensive air and sea search. Triple 0 receives up to 27,000 calls nationally each day, and around 78 per cent of these calls originate from a mobile phone, so accurate location data is critical.

I want to thank all of those in my former office, in the department, in the working group that was established to bring together representatives of emergency services and in the various departments and agencies with policy responsibility for communications for all the work that was done to implement advanced mobile location. This work has been enormously important and has undoubtedly saved lives.

While the opposition supports the objectives of this bill for the reasons I have given, we do recognise that there are some privacy concerns that have been raised in relation to the provisions of the bill. More broadly, we recognise the critical need to protect the privacy and personal data of all Australians. It is very important therefore to make sure that this bill does not give rise to any unintended consequences. A question which arises, for example, is whether the bill provides adequate safeguards for a person fleeing family violence under circumstances where the perpetrator might make a false missing person report with the aim of securing information about the whereabouts of the victim-survivor. The opposition is concerned that the government has not consulted sufficiently on this point in relation to this bill, including with family violence organisations.

Our concerns were increased by what we learnt through questioning on this matter in Senate estimates on 23 November. It is for this reason that the opposition supported a motion to refer this bill to the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by March 2023—that is to say, it is important that this matter be carefully considered to ascertain whether there are appropriate safeguards within the bill against breaches of privacy and personal data that could, particularly in the case of victims-survivors of domestic violence, put people in danger. That is a question which does need to be properly examined and answered.

I conclude, firstly, by referring to the strong record of this side of the House when it comes to increasing the safety of Australians by making better data available in relation to the location of those who are at risk, and, secondly, by indicating the opposition's awareness of and, in the broad, support for the objectives of this bill. I note only our concern about privacy issues and wanting to be satisfied that these issues are properly worked through, including through the Senate committee process.

James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I join my colleague the member for Bradfield in expressing support for the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Information Disclosure, National Interest and Other Measures) Bill 2022, but I'll put on the record a few points about caution in this area.

To begin with I'll mention, very proudly, that Fivecast, a business from my electorate, was successful at the Australian Export Awards held here in Parliament House last Thursday night. That business does a lot of work with law enforcement agencies as far as receiving data and using publicly accessible sources to help and support law enforcement agencies in a variety of things that they do. One really heartening example of things they are a part of is the recent search for the little girl in Western Australia who was kidnapped and, thankfully, found safely some days later. They were involved in supporting Western Australian police by providing them with intelligence services that led to the location of that little girl. One of the things that was helpful was mobile phone data and information.

We certainly agree that there's a need to change the law to give better, clearer and cleaner access to data that can help save lives. Obviously, there's complete unity in this chamber on that objective. My brief word of caution is that, every time we have these bills to modernise laws regarding new and emerging technology that can be used to help law enforcement do their job, we should be wary that there's the right justification for providing those powers, and that they stop at the point that is necessary and don't ever creep further.

We are talking about personal data and information about people which, as we all know, is extremely topical in this country right now. There is a lot of wariness about people's data falling into the wrong hands and then being used against people. Regrettably, right now we're seeing blackmail and extortion of people and companies. Customer information of a personal nature is taken from companies, and these companies are being threatened with significant consequences. The victims are not the companies; the victims are the people whose data is being released publicly with the object of embarrassing them. We've seen that with the Medicare and Optus matters, and unfortunately there is a significant risk of it continuing to happen into the future.

When we're adjusting the law, as we are in this case, to give smoother, cleaner and more comprehensive access to data on people that in the past has been protected, we want to do that for the right reasons. The reasons for these amendments are the right reasons, but we as a parliament always need to be vigilant and wary, when the executive—the government—the department and others put forward these proposals, that the changes, the new powers that are being asked for, meet the requirements we expect. I am wary about making sure that into the future we are always very careful about law changes that are going to put more information about people into the public realm.

Those concerns have been outlined by the Manager of Opposition Business. He has also made it very clear that the previous government was in support of this legislation. For that reason, we are very comfortable with supporting this amendment bill through the chamber. I clarify that we will always be very wary about requests to make it easier for information on the citizens of our country to be kept and passed on, but in this case the reasons for the change are valid and meritorious. We certainly hope that these changes will make it easier for our agencies to save lives. If we do nothing more than that in this place today, it will have been a good day's work at the office. I commend the bill to the House.

Russell Broadbent (Monash, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Deputy Speaker, isn't new technology fantastic? It can do amazing things. I had a friend talk to me about a woman who was worried about her husband because he was late home from work and he had never before been late home from work. She rang the local police and said, 'I'm really worried about my husband.' Somehow, the police did a 'Where's my phone?'—I don't know how they do that—and located his car. He had pulled over near a beach—he must have been feeling unwell—and sadly, while he was overlooking the beach, had died of a heart attack. That was sad, but the new technology used by local police found him very, very quickly, and that side of the story is great.

I heard of a crime case in Melbourne, going back a few years now, where a person of interest was able to be traced by the cross-checking of phone towers to see where that person's phone had travelled on a particular day. That person was identified as the person that the police were looking for in regard to a murder or some other terrible situation.

I have not got a problem with using fantastic new technology for the benefit of society—and I say 'the benefit'. As the shadow minister pointed out in his remarks,145 people a day go missing in Australia. We charge our police and other emergency services to go out and, hopefully, find those people. They do so, hopefully, having full regard of the legislation that covers their responsibilities. It has been outlined by the government very clearly that there are safeguards in this, but in truth we are giving police and other emergency services more freedom to access people's data more easily. This is your data. You own this data. You own your phone. You hope you're being listened to or covered or identified. But I have maps on my phone. You can tell where I am any time you like by just looking at these maps to see where my car is or where my phone is. Deputy Speaker Vamvakinou, you can see whether my phone is next to your phone when you come to my office to have a chat, or I go to your office. People can tell where those two phones are at any given time, so everybody knows when we've met. We don't have to broadcast it or tell anybody because our phone data will tell people when we're having a discussion.

Are there enough safeguards in this legislation? Our Public Service and our government believe that, yes, they have covered the ground through the Privacy Act, or they have done their best to give direction to the agencies as to how they can act in this regard. This bill takes out the word 'imminent' if someone is under threat immediately or imminently. Taking it out gives greater freedom to the agencies to investigate a particular situation. We should think that's all good because it saves lives when it finds people. They might have found a man who had a heart attack earlier. Had they had found him, could they have saved him? Sometimes, yes, sometimes, no. But we'd have the ability to use this new technology in the best interests of our nation.

I believe the drafters of this legislation have put in place safeguards for our nation's and our people's best interest. But they should remember that, in doing so, they have handed more power to police or other agencies to use this power for good. I believe that people will always use this for good in the best interests of investigating a difficult situation. But I also have in the back of my mind that there may be those who will not use this information in the nation's best interest when investigating difficult issues. They might use it to their personal advantage to find out about someone, their movements, where they go, what they do, which is entirely inappropriate. It could be seen by some as a creeping infringement on their right to privacy.

How do you balance that? Well, I don't know how to balance that. You take the new technology and say: 'Here, we've got this fantastic new technology. We can now do things we've never been able to do before.' But is that a creeping interference on the freedoms of the individual in Australia—freedom of association, freedom of expression? Have we taken into account enough that, if we need a judge to make a decision as to whether someone can access someone else's privacy, that takes time? We can get a senior police officer to make a decision. Well, they're busy. They're going to say, 'Yes, tick. Do what you've got to do.' As an individual I am particularly concerned that, if these powers are not used correctly, it's a definite infringement on the privacy of the individuals concerned.

But when you have a situation where 145 people a day go missing in Australia, which I thought was a staggering number—145 people decide they're going to disappear in a day, in 26 million people—that's thousands and thousands over a year and over two, three or four years. Out of 26 million Australians some 20 million have a mobile phone or two, and those mobile phones can be tracked anywhere at any time by anybody, apparently—not by anybody, because my use of technology would not be able to find you in the building, let alone in the broader world.

But there are a number of pieces of legislation including digital identity, and now I find out that I have to have a particular digital identity for an individual business, as well as the director—as well as, as well as, as well as. So government seems to be encroaching on my identity in more ways than I consider reasonable at this time. Every bit of legislation that comes through this place has the best intentions. At the same time, I didn't need a digital identity six months ago to be a director of my self-managed super fund, small as it is, but now I have to have a digital identity. If I don't have it by the end of the month, I'll get a $13,000 fine for not having a digital identity, and I don't want this type of legislation to be encroaching and encroaching and encroaching, evermore.

Through this genuine legislation, people are saying, 'No, this is new technology. We can use it so well to find out where people are and what they're doing, especially if they're doing the wrong thing by the nation.' But then we've got to temper that with the freedoms that are so precious to the Australian people. You do that through legislation just like this, so we actually change it to address new technology. There'll be more new technology that comes through; there's absolutely no doubt about that. In fact, where we've come from, just in my lifetime, let alone my father's lifetime, massive changes have happened and are happening with a rapidity and an energy that I don't think any of us could have believed.

When I first had a mobile phone, it was a brick battery about that high and sat in a great dumpster in the middle of the car. A close friend of mine rang me, and I said, 'Where are you?' He said, 'I'm just driving out of Darwin,' so here I was on this mobile phone in Cranbourne with somebody ringing me from Darwin in the car. I remember Peter Boyle had this joke. He used to get off the phone and say, 'Excuse me, my other phone's ringing in the car.' They were the days when we were just setting out. Now we do more with our smartphones than they did on NASA's first mission.

Here we stand today in the parliament trying to balance the privacy of the individual against the greater good. We need to be really, really aware of every piece of legislation that comes through that actually reduces the freedom of the individual. We need to be on guard for the protection of our children. My generation? Don't worry about us. But where will this lead to for our children and their children? Are they going to be under surveillance the whole time? Are they going to be recognised by their digital identity when they walk into a supermarket? Are they going to be recognised by what their phone is putting out or on what they purchase? Will it be total control or oversight of what we're doing?

So we as a parliament then have a direct responsibility to act on behalf of the Australian people, to act on behalf of those who cannot act on their own. They will say: 'Mr Broadbent, that's your problem. You're the legislator. You watch that on our behalf. That's what we elected you for.' They elected us on their behalf to watch over the legislation that comes through this place. Do we do it? Am I across every piece of legislation that is going to be passed in this building today, tomorrow or the next day? No. I take an interest in particular pieces of legislation like this one, but do I watch every piece? I watch every piece that is going to have a subtle effect on individuals' freedom in this nation because, if I don't defend it and this parliament doesn't defend it, nobody will.

This may be a cliche for you, but the men and women who died in the First World War and Second World War and all of the other wars that we have been engaged in died under the banner of freedom for this nation. People want to come to this nation by boat or aeroplane—anyway they can get here—because they see this nation as free and the nation they are fleeing from as not free. We are held up as a beacon of freedom. Therefore, in every bit of legislation that comes before this House we have to protect those freedoms. Are they out of hand because of new technology and legislation to then back up that technology? Yes. I don't think we can keep up with what is going on. This legislation is directly reflecting the fact that we can't keep up with new technology and how it may be used or will be used.

If it's used for the greater good, I am all for this legislation and we will be supporting the amendments of this legislation. But fallen into the wrong hands it could be used for the lesser good, not our best selves. That can happen at any organisation. We've seen data breaches over the last two to three months that would frighten anybody, and we are always fearful of that happening in government. So we are supporting the legislation, but we are making sure we have very close regard for the freedoms and privacy of the individuals of this nation.

Sam Birrell (Nicholls, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to rise to speak on the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Information Disclosure, National Interest and Other Measures) Bill 2022. I recognise the importance of this legislation and that in some circumstances access to a missing person's mobile phone location data, known as 'triangulation', can mean the difference between life and death. In fact, it was the coalition that rolled out advanced mobile location, or AML, technology. This technology is embedded in the operating systems of Apple and Android phones to provide greater location accuracy to 000 services, for example, during an emergency call from a mobile telephone. This bill further advances the ability of law enforcement and emergency services agencies to access mobile phone location data. That can be critical when somebody goes missing.

This change is subtle but important. The Telecommunications Act includes general prohibitions on carriers and carriage service providers disclosing certain information or documents, including telecommunications data. There are some important exceptions, including where disclosure of this information is 'reasonably necessary to prevent or lessen a serious and imminent threat to life or health of a person'. The removal of the word 'imminent' supports recommendations from a number of state coroners and the Australian Law Reform Commission. The reason its removal was supported is that it set too high a bar for access to location data. So this bill removes the word imminent but also includes an important safeguard—that the entity or person being asked to disclose the information needs to be satisfied if it's unreasonable or impractical to obtain the other person's consent to the proposed disclosure or use.

What else does this bill achieve? The bill also authorises the use and disclosure of unlisted numbers—for example, some mobile phone numbers—and associated addresses for the purpose of dealing with matters raised by a call to an emergency service number. An example of how this will apply is where a caller can't provide the location of an emergency. The bill clarifies that carriers, carriage service providers and carriage service intermediaries will not be liable for damages where such entities are, acting in good faith, providing reasonable and necessary assistance to emergency services organisations. It makes some technical amendments, including clarifying the definition of a telecommunications transmission tower.

In principle, these measures are supported but we believe more work needs to be done. The opposition is concerned that the government has failed to adequately consult on the bill and address legitimate privacy concerns about a proposed change in the law that would make it easier to access somebody's mobile phone location data. Data security, particularly at the moment, is top of mind for many Australians. This year alone we've had a number of major data thefts, including from Optus, which has 9.8 million customers, and Medibank, which has 3.9 million customers. These are the biggest ones, but dozens of companies and institutions have fallen victim to hacking and data theft.

Scams are also flourishing. During Scams Awareness Week, earlier this month, the ACCC's Scamwatch revealed that losses from scams totalled more than $2 billion last year. This year it could reach $4 billion. Scamwatch received more than 166 reports, between January and September this year, showing a 90 per cent increase in losses to $424.8 million over the same period last year. The ACCC's deputy chair, Delia Rickard, said during the week:

Scammers evolve quickly, and their tactics are becoming increasingly sophisticated and unscrupulous. There have been hundreds of reports to Scamwatch in the weeks after the recent high profile data breaches and that is expected to continue … Cyber criminals have capitalised on the data breach by impersonating government departments and businesses to carry out identity theft and remote access scams.

Australians are being targeted relentlessly by these scammers. We believe the Albanese government must urgently pass new laws to combat scams on online platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, including services such as WhatsApp and Messenger.

The former coalition government in December 2020 announced a new industry code, the Reducing Scam Calls Code, which requires telecommunications companies to detect, trace and block scam calls. In November 2021 the coalition made an important regulatory amendment, empowering the telecommunications sector, to identify and block SMS scams at the source. As a result of this work, new rules to identify, trace and block SMS scams came into force in July 2022. These laws have blocked an estimated 800 million scam calls and 48 million SMS scams. The Australian Media and Communications Authority, which administers the scam blocking, needs the power to force the global tech giants to detect, trace and block scams, ensuring companies like Meta, Twitter and Google are more accountable for the harm they are facilitating.

No sector is immune from this type of behaviour and situations. In October, farmers and small businesses in rural and regional areas were urged to be cautious, particularly when buying heavy machinery, following a spike in scams targeting the agricultural sector this year. And there's concern about this in my own electorate of Nicholls. Reports to the ACCC's Scamwatch show that Australian farm businesses lost more than $1.2 million to scammers between 1 January and 31 August 2022, an increase of more than 20 per cent compared to the same period last year. They can ill afford that at any time but particularly not at the moment, with all the other challenges that regional and rural Australia are facing.

Australians are increasingly sensitive about how their data is managed given the high-profile data thefts that have elevated the risk to millions of Australians of being targeted by scams. It is understandable that the management and security of data has become a top-of-mind issue. The accessing of Australians' data must be appropriately balanced with the need to ensure that their data is properly protected. Accordingly, the opposition is proposing that the bill be referred to a Senate committee for inquiry. It's important that anyone wishing to provide feedback or raise concerns about the bill, including civil liberties groups, has a proper opportunity to do so. So we must be as equally concerned about the misuse of data as we are about allowing access, even if that access is designed to protect people and save lives.

The coalition has got a strong track record in telecommunications: we funded more than 1,200 mobile base stations, delivering record investment to support regional connectivity, and improved telecommunications infrastructure for disaster resilience, including in the electorate of Nicholls. The coalition established the world's first eSafety Commissioner, through the Online Safety Act, which extends important online safety protections to adults. We also moved to hold global digital platforms to account, including under the news media bargaining code.

In the October budget, Labor cut telecommunications funding and groundbreaking investments in regional connectivity, including in disaster resilience, which once again demonstrates Labor's disregard for rural and regional Australia. Those cuts include a $106 million program to boost resilience and telecommunications infrastructure for natural disasters in vulnerable locations, and a much smaller commitment of $30.4 million has been made for the Department of Home Affairs for resilience initiatives, including infrastructure. It's a heartless decision at a time when so many regional communities are in the grip of a flood disaster.

The $30 million under the coalition that was for various internet affordability measures in regional and rural Australia is now just $4.7 million, and the $5 million for emerging technology trials has been scrapped. The $418 million for open access or multicarrier mobile is now $400 million. The Mobile Black Spot Program has been cut by $37.5 million, the lowest level of investment since 2015. While adopting the coalition's plan to extend the Peri-Urban Mobile Program, or PUMP, to regional cities—as the opposition called for—Labor is providing only half of the $78.5 million amount committed by the coalition.

Rural and regional communities deserve better. We are a vast nation, but that's not an excuse for having a two-tier telecommunication system. I urge the government to ramp up investment in regional telecommunications because the regions are critical to our economy, our exports and our jobs. Blackspots, poor service quality and a lack of access to the latest telecommunications technology are the subject of frequent representations to my office and many offices in regional and remote Australia. Telecommunications in the regions is critical for business and for participation in the digital economy, and it requires constant investment, not cuts.

In summary, I support the changes made by this bill, with some reservation regarding the protection of data and the level of consultation to date, and I reaffirm my urging of the government to keep investing in regional and rural telecommunications infrastructure. It's necessary for continuing the modernisation of our agricultural businesses, in moving people who want to work remotely from cities to the regions and for getting the population balance going in our country that we all want to see. I know the member for Bendigo agrees with that desire to see the regional cities in Victoria thrive. Thank you very much.

Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour.