Brandis pledges ASIO funds at CeBIT

SHADOW Attorney-General George Brandis has used CeBIT to pledge the Coalition to resourcing Australia’s security organisations.

George Brandis

SHADOW Attorney-General George Brandis has used the forum of the CeBIT technology show to pledge the Coalition to adequately resourcing AustraliaÂ’s security organisations.

Senator Brandis gave the undertaking at a cyber-security forum held by CeBIT following two major incidents: an alleged breach of ASIO security by Chinese hackers and criticism by a Labor parliamentary committee chair who has branded the funding of Australia’s security agencies as “disgraceful”.

Senator Brandis spoke of how the fear of terrorism had usurped the fear of war in the public’s mind, how the former Howard government had amended the criminal code to define a terrorism act, and said the most damaging acts of terrorism may not involve physical violence – rather cyber-terrorism attacks against essential public utilities, transport systems, information systems, telecommunications and financial systems.

But the Senator was on the offensive following an ABC Four Corners report on Monday that alleged that documents detailing the communication cable layouts, server locations and security systems of ASIO’s new spy centre had all been illegally accessed.

That revelation was on the back of criticism by Anthony Byrne, a Labor backbencher chairing parliament’s committee dealing with intelligence and security issues. In response to concern about how efficiency dividends over 25 years had eroded security agencies’ abilities to function effectively, Mr Byrne said: "I think it's disgraceful and it should be addressed."

Senator Brandis told the forum: “The problem we have is that at a time resources are being taken away from them, the obligations and the burdens imposed upon them are increasing very significantly.”

“Things that were being done five years ago are not being done today. Things that were being detected five years ago are being missed today.

“So a Coalition government would certainly seek to arrest that degradation of capacity.“

Costings would be released in the lead up to the election, he said.

Senator Brandis said he and Coalition deputy leader Julie Bishop were due yesterday to be briefed on the alleged ASIO hacking attack by ASIO’s director-general.

The Australian today reports that the alleged breach may have occurred as long ago as 2009 and discovery of the breach meant ASIO had the opportunity to alter the designs of the building to reduce the risk of espionage.

While declining to tie the funding issue to the alleged ASIO security breach, Senator Brandis labelled Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus’s response of “no comment” to the alleged cyber attack as “inadequate”.

“I understand the Attorney-General has to be careful here in relation to the alleged breach … in what he says. Given the seriousness of the allegations, I don’t believe and the Opposition doesn’t believe that a simple “no comment” from the Attorney-General is an adequate response.”

Senator Brandis said he had “a high level of confidence” in the Coalition’s ability to stem the flow of “irregular maritime arrivals” with the passage of time and ASIO’s involvement in assessing more than 34,000 arrivals had soaked up its resources.

The Coalition would address both that and offer adequate financial resources to reverse the degradation both in the capacity of ASIO and the other security agencies.

Earlier at the conference Senator Brandis said the response to terrorism was among the most difficult and complex issues facing governments today and that since 9/11, the fear of terrorism had come to rival, if not to overtake, the fear of war.

He said “attacks upon the degradation of systems” were among the most damaging forms of terrorism and these attacks were more often engaged in by nation states.

“The alleged sponsorship by certain governments and in particular by elements of their military of cyber terrorism is one of the most threatening of all forms of modern terrorism,” he said.

Western Australia Greens Senator Scott Ludham, also speaking at the forum, attacked the Coalition and Labor over moves to compel telcos to retain records of their users mobile phone activities- so-called “data retention”.

He said the concept involved prejudging members of the public as potential criminals as it required Australia’s telcos to retain information about users ahead of the possibility they may in future commit a crime.

He said data retention requirements would “put a lead weight around the neck of smaller ISPs” (internet service providers) required to install equipment to track users.