Third batch of anti-terrorist legislation demands details of our emails and phone calls be kept for two years

Phone call and email details will be stored for two years under the Federal Government’s controversial metadata bill

Girl using smart phone

Critical details of every phone call you make and email you send will be stored for two years under legislation the Federal Government introduced today.

This information will be combed by police when they fear members of a criminal gang are chatting or by intelligence agencies when they think terrorists are plotting.

Here’s the metadata from your messages which would be stored:

■ Name of the subscriber to a communication service

■ Destination of communication

■ Date, time and duration of the communication

■ Type of communication

■ Location of the equipment used in the communication

Attorney-General George Brandis today said the contents of a message would not be kept, and our web browsing will not be stored either.

Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who introduced the legislation, underlined the limits to the material stored and said the legislation would not create new classes of data to be retained.

“So, in the telephone world, it reveals that one number belonging to a particular account was connected to another number at a time and for a duration,” Mr Turnbull told Parliament.

“But does not reveal what they discussed.”

Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull

To get that content authorities would have to get a warrant from a judge.

And the legislation would not require detailed location records which might be used to track a person.

The material would be available to what Mr Turnbull called “traditional” law enforcement agencies such as police, Customs, crime commissions and anti-corruption inquiries, as well as security agencies such as ASIO.

But if passed, the legislation would allow the Government to add to that list.

The Government is insisting police and security bodies are not being given any extra powers under the proposed laws. They have previously had access to this information, but now it is disappearing sooner than they want.

“Simply put,” said Mr Turnbull, “investigations are failing.”

The problem is that business practices and new technology means communications companies are not retaining the metadata for as long as they used to.

The legislation will go to the parliamentary joint committee on security matters which has the power to recommend amendments and other changes.

One outstanding matter is a basic one: Who pays?

It is almost certain communications will pass the costs of storing masses of information for two years onto customers, in what Greens Senator Scott Ludlum has called a surveillance tax. But the Government is also expected to chip in.

Senator Ludlum said the two-year retention contravened privacy principles condemning the storage of information not needed.

The Greens and privacy groups will oppose the measure.