A shot in the dark: Australia's proposed encryption laws and the 'disruption calculus'
Brendan Walker-Munro
Abstract
In December 2018, in response to several foiled terrorist attacks, Australia passed some of the most intrusive telecommunications interception legislation in Australian legal history. Yet the response of the Australian Government is not a cohesive strategy designed to deal with the disruption caused by the emergence and abundance of encrypted messaging. This article deals with the legislative amendments encapsulated in the Telecommunications and Other Legislation Amendment (Assistance and Access) Bill 2018 (Cth) ('the Bill'), and addresses the issues of scope and scale which remain unresolved in spite of these changes. It then reflects upon a new concept - the 'disruption calculus' - to illustrate that the new amendments are unlikely to achieve the regulatory aims sought by intelligence and police forces in Australia. Finally, the article uses Israel's model of encryption regulation to illustrate that a more varied and holistic approach in line with the disruption calculus can provide an effective alternative for regulatory authorities in Australia
2 citations
Evidence weight
Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40
| F · citation impact | 0.22 × 0.4 = 0.09 |
| M · momentum | 0.20 × 0.15 = 0.03 |
| V · venue signal | 0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03 |
| R · text relevance † | 0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20 |
† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.