Airbnb officially launches in Australia

0
A quick search of accommodation crowdsourcing website Airbnb reveals that it’s been operating in Australia for a while (or at least taking bookings and accommodation advertisements from Australians), but the US-based startup hasn’t previously had an official presence Down Under. Until now.

Pauline Hanson to fix NBN “white elephant” with FTTN/Wi-Fi combo

74
Senator-Elect Pauline Hanson wants to use a combination of Fibre to the Node and a wireless technology similar to Wi-Fi, it has emerged, as the One Nation Leader takes a step into the national spotlight courtesy of her victory in the Senate over the weekend.

Mike Quigley to join NBN election debate

141
The founding chief executive of the NBN company, Mike Quigley will publicly discuss the history of the National Broadband Network as well as the various options for its future, in a major speech to be held just over a week before this year's Federal Election on 2 July.

The Inside Track: The Coalition is strongly hinting it won’t support a FTTdp NBN

22
Fifield and Turnbull are clearly aware that Labor is likely to announce a FTTdp-based NBN policy in the near future. What we are very likely seeing here is the advance start of an effort by the Coalition to lay the groundwork for a strategy of disparaging a FTTdp-based NBN policy issued by Labor.

NBN rejects analysis: FTTP rollout to take “significantly longer”

55
The NBN company has called into question the validity of a detailed value analysis by a Monash University researcher, stating that a full Fibre to the Premises rollout would take significantly longer to achieve in Australia than its current Multi-Technology Mix model.

Greens demand Australia cancel ACTA participation

11
The Greens have demanded that Australia's Government cancel its participation in the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement international treaty in the wake of an expected imminent rejection of the proposal by the European Union and significant and ongoing global protests against a number of its terms expected to harm Internet freedom.

Labor calls on Govt to bring forward tax incentives for investors

1
Labor has called on the government to bring forward the start date of its tax incentives for investors over its concerns about an "investor strike" affecting Australian startups.

Liberal Democrats oppose data retention

1
Into the e-surveillance miasma comes David Leyonhjelm, the new Senator-Elect for the Liberal Democrats, who will take his chair in just six short weeks. In a piece for the Financial Review newspaper late last week, Leyonhjelm makes it very clear where his party will stand on this issue: In opposition to data retention and similar initiatives which erode Australians’ privacy.

Q&A panellists agree: Politicians have completely screwed up the NBN

100
A trio of independent technology experts on the ABC's Q and A program last night heavily criticised Australia's political sector for politicising, lying about, and ultimately destroying the all-fibre National Broadband Network they agreed the country needed to progress its innovative future.

Qld Govt invests $1 million in drone tech

2
The Queensland Government has invested $1m in drone technology – a move that the State Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said will lead to 100 new aerospace industry jobs.

IT price hike inquiry will approach record labels

11
How seriously can we take Apple Australia managing director Anthony King's claim that Apple doesn't have anything to do with setting digital content prices in Australia through the company's iTunes store? I guess we're about to find out.

AFP monitoring phone data of MPs

2
When Greens Communications spokesperson Scott Ludlam said in January 2012 that he suspected law enforcement agencies of bugging his mobile phone, we criticised the Senator for making the claim without providing evidence of the claimed nefarious activity. But according to the ABC, the Australian Federal Police admitted in a Senate Estimates session this week that it had monitored various MPs’ communications.

Government issues draft amendments to Copyright Act

2
The government has announced proposed changes that are designed to simplify and modernise Australia's copyright laws.

Cybercrime bill passes despite Greens protest

22
A controversial piece of legislation aiming to bolster the powers of law enforcement agencies has passed the Federal Senate, despite vehement protests from the Greens, who argued strongly that the bill was "yet another" unnecessary expansion of the Government's surveillance powers in Australia.

House Foxtel: Unbowed, Unbent and Unreasonable

68
The argument by pay television giant Foxtel that the launch of its new Play IPTV streaming video service will cause Australians' objections about the lack of legitimate access to popular shows such as Game of Thrones to "vanish" is nothing short of ridiculous and strongly indicates that the company still has no idea why the nation is so frustrated with it.

Amazon mulls Aussie distribution centre

14
According to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald, giant international Internet retailer and cloud computing giant Amazon is considering deploying a distribution centre -- Amazon-speak for giant warehouse filled with goods to ship to customers -- in Australia.

Truth: Turnbull’s new Communications Minister is … Malcolm Turnbull

1
Seven days ago Malcolm Turnbull formally resigned as Communications Minister to take the top role from Tony Abbott. But yesterday’s Cabinet reshuffle reveals that upgrade to be an illusion: Our new PM will, in fact, retain direct control of his former portfolio through several able lieutenants who will do exactly as he bids.

Greens get their surveillance inquiry

8
Following several unsuccessful attempts, the Greens have successfully moved a motion in the Senate to establish a formal inquiry into Internet surveillance, through a review that will take place into the controversial Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act.

Bell Canada plans 10Gbps speeds for ‘easier to maintain’ FTTP

52
Canadian telco Bell Canada has revealed it is planning to extend its Fibre to the Premises network to some 2.2 million premises by the end of 2015, hyping the technology as being far easier to maintain than Fibre to the Node and also being capable of delivering 10Gbps speeds to customers by 2017.

Truth: The Greens’ video game policy is a landmark strategy with a good chance...

4
The Greens' video game industry policy released this week represents the kind of landmark policy launch that the local industry has needed for the past decade. What's more, it has an excellent chance of actually becoming reality.

Did Russia give Bob Carr a bugged USB key?

13
According to massive Italian newspaper Corrierre della Sera, through the Daily Telegraph in Australia (we recommend you click here for the Daily Telegraph’s version, as it’s not in Italian), at the recent G20 Summit in Russia, the country gave G20 leaders, including then-Foreign Minister Bob Carr, USB keys which included bugging functionality

Carr: CSIRO still worse off than before election

3
An opposition minister has said that the CSIRO is still worse off than it was before the last election – despite funding announced in Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's Innovation Statement on 7 December.

Major tech firms, Australian startups back new innovation organisation TechSydney

2
A group of local startups and global tech giants, including Atlassian, Airbnb and LinkedIn, have offered support for a new not-for-profit organisation that aims to "turn Sydney into Australia’s Silicon Valley".

UK file-sharers face disconnections after court ruling

3
Internet service providers BT and TalkTalk have lost their appeal against the UK’s Digital Economy Act. The ISPs had argued that the legislation was incompatible with EU law, but this morning the Court of Appeal decided otherwise and dismissed their appeal. While the decision was welcomed by copyright holders, Internet account holders now face warnings, disconnections and speed throttling.

PM Turnbull using Netregistry email for official business

14
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has acknowledged he is using a private email platform hosted by a non-government provider for official business relating to his ministerial roles, in a revelation which has already reminded commentators of the hot water which US presidential candidate Hilary Clinton found herself in for the same behaviour.

NBN CTO pitches 5Gbps speeds for HFC cable modems

75
The chief technology officer of the NBN company yesterday said new modems launched by the company's equipment supplier ARRIS will allow theoretical top speeds of 5Gbps down and 2Gbps up, in comments which appear to run contrary to ongoing claims by the company that Australians are not interested in gigabit NBN speeds.

Photos: Nodes Behaving Badly (when FTTN placement goes wrong)

74
Today, Delimiter is proud to present a photo gallery entitled Nodes Behaving Badly, in which we highlight some of the worst Fibre to the Node infrastructure placement that Australia has to offer.

Teenage hacker evaded police and left Australia under own passport, now appears on national...

7
Last week the ABC's flagship current affairs program 7:30 covered the somewhat extraordinary story of Dylan Wheeler, an Australian teenager. According to the program, Wheeler has not only been charged by Australian police on hacking offences, but he has also been highlighted by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for his activities. None of this, however, appears to have stopped Wheeler from leaving Australia on his own passport or subsequently appearing on national television.

Budget 2016: Australian Computer Society welcomes digital Budget

4
The Australian Computer Society (ACS) has welcomed Tuesday's Federal Budget announcement, saying it delivers "good news for jobs and skills in the digital sector".

FTTN congestion often ‘user error’, says Turnbull

88
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has dismissed widespread complaints from early adopters of the Government's preferred Fibre to the Node rollout model that the technology is slower than ADSL, attributing many of the issues to end users' home setups, including their computers and Wi-Fi routers.

NBN to hold HFC launch days before Election

91
The NBN company has revealed plans to hold a product launch just days before the upcoming Federal Election, in a move which has the potential to be interpreted as a breach of the Caretaker Conventions that govern the pre-election behaviour of public sector organisations.

Telstra says it has 50 percent NBN market share, wants more

41
Telstra this week said it had already taken a 50 percent market share of National Broadband Network customers and wanted to push to achieve even more, in news set to call into question controversial NBN decisions made by the Government and the ACCC meant to advance broadband competition.

Labor promises $4.5m to inspire women to learn coding

57
The Australian Labor Party this morning announced that it would put $4.5 million towards a grants program to promote, encourage and inspire more Australian girls to learn coding, if it wins power in the upcoming Federal Election.

Govt admits staff lost IT equipment valued at over $100k

5
Government employees have cost the taxpayer may thousands of dollars-worth in lost or stolen IT equipment, it has been revealed.

Data retention secrecy: AFP unable to disclose journo, MP metadata requests

3
The Australian Federal Police has refused to answer questions from a Federal Senator about whether it has recently accessed the metadata of journalists, politicians or political staffers, on the basis that doing so would be illegal under new Data Retention legislation.

NBN overbuild based on “fairer competition”, says Turnbull

23
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has issued a statement to the effect that the NBN company’s alleged “overbuilding” activities were based on regulatory decisions to ensure “fairer” competition in the broadband market that would allow the NBN company to compete with commercial providers.

61 agencies apply for metadata access

13
61 separate departments and agencies around Australia have petitioned the Attorney-General's Department to gain unwarranted access to Australians' metadata under the Government's Data Retention scheme, including minor organisations such as Bankstown City Council and the National Measurement Institute.

iiNet, Internode implement Conroy’s new filter

17
National broadband provider iiNet and its subsidiary Internode have pledged to implement the limited child abuse Internet filtering scheme adopted as policy last week by the Federal Government, noting they had received independent legal advice advising them to comply with a new "compulsory" request by police to do so.

Turnbull revises history on NBN satellite demand

69
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has accused the Australian Labor Party of underestimating how much demand the National Broadband Network would see for its satellite service, without mentioning that he personally had stated in Opposition that sufficient capacity already existed, alleging there was no need to build more.

Success: “Skinny” fibre trial cut FTTP costs by $450, rollout time by 4 weeks

123
The NBN company this morning revealed that its trial of "skinny fibre" to some 4,500 homes in the Victorian towns of Ballarat and Karingal had been highly successful, cutting the cost per premise of a Fibre to the Premise rollout by $450 and the rollout time by four weeks.

Telstra may be deploying brand new greenfields copper

73
The Department of Communications has published statistics which appear to show that incumbent telco Telstra has deployed brand new copper to hundreds of new development premises around Australia, as a direct result of the Turnbull Government's new greenfields NBN policy.

You talkin’ to me? Gerry Harvey’s one-man, online retail debate

9
Online retail promises or threatens to greatly change how Australians buy and sell over the next few years. However it works out, I hope that Gerry Harvey is around a fair bit longer, saying things to provoke and amuse us.

ACCC raises competition concerns over NBN’s Telstra HFC deal

14
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has expressed concerns around Telstra’s involvement in the rollout of the NBN network, saying it poses a threat to competition.

AFP NBN raids illegal, says Conroy: Ziggy must resign

128
Labor Senator Stephen Conroy has obtained legal advice that the NBN company's referral of whistleblowers to the Australian Federal Police was illegal, and has demanded that NBN chair Ziggy Switkowski resign from his post as a result and that the AFP cease its investigations into the matter.

The Cyber Security Strategy is only a small step in the right direction

1
Our reliance on technology is now a given and cybersecurity is as important a consideration as protecting our health, food and water sources and general environment. From that perspective, the cybersecurity strategy is a welcome but very small step in the right direction.

Ziggy was forced to respond to false accusations, says NBN Co

37
The NBN Company has defended the actions of its chair Ziggy Switkowski in breaching the Caretaker Conventions, claiming that the executive's hand was forced by the need to defend the company's reputation.

ACCC letting NBN descend into retail “market failure”, says Macquarie

69
Top-tier business telco Macquarie Telecom has accused the ACCC of having little idea of what is going on in the competitive NBN market, in the wake of comments made by the competition regulator that it was not planning re-examine its controversial decision to set the number of points of interconnect with the NBN at 121.

Tassie Govt criticises TPG over Basslink Internet issues

12
The Tasmanian Government has expressed its disappointment over service interruptions for customers of TPG's Internet service provider brands following the cutting of the Basslink cable.

NBN Sky Muster broadband will be “world leading”, says Ovum report

12
Telecoms research firm Ovum has announced that the NBN Sky Muster satellite broadband service will be a "world leader" in its market.

AT&T, Google launch new 1Gbps FTTP networks in US

58
US technology giants AT&T and Google this week launched new Fibre to the Premises networks in several US cities, with the flagship feature of the networks being their ability to offer gigabit speeds (1Gbps) to residents and businesses in the areas they cover.

Global hacker crackdown hits Aussies

4
Picked up a copy of the 'Blackshades' remote administration tool recently? You may be on the FBI's target list. The Wall Street Journal reports in the US over the weekend that US authorities have worked with law enforcement authorities in a range of countries to raid the homes of those who have been using the software.

Govt invests in big data, surveillance systems for AFP, ACC

0
The Coalition Government has announced it is to invest $2.6 million in a big data and surveillance projects for the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Crime Commission.

Senate passes bill to block tax avoidance by multinationals

9
The Senate has passed new legislation aimed to ensure tax is paid by major international companies that operate in Australia but book profits offshore.

1,375 votes lost in Western Australia: Ludlam recount stalled in bureaucracy

25
The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) has revealed it lost 1,375 votes during the recent Federal Election and will need to investigate the situation further before it can advise whether Greens Communications Spokesperson Scott Ludlam will keep his Senate seat or be replaced by the Palmer United Party.

Infrastructure Australia reveals almost no specific basis for NBN privatisation push

17
Infrastructure Australia has revealed it did not consult more than a handful of sources or organisations when making its recommendation in mid-February that the National Broadband Network be split up into pieces and sold off to the private sector.

Google boss: let Internet flourish to boost productivity

0
The annual $27-billion boost to Australia’s productivity from internet innovation is at threat from policymakers who would rather restrict online access than embrace it, Google’s Australia boss has warned.

Fifield says Shorten’s FTTP NBN promise is “flaky”, uncosted

144
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has labelled a pledge by Bill Shorten to bring a "greater role" for Fibre to the Premises technology in the NBN as "flaky", saying the Opposition Leader did not specify exactly what the promise would cost and what it meant.

Python-iView: Copyright crusader or vigilante operative?

7
The issue of whether the Python-iView app infringes copyright, particularly it’s download feature, hinges on a number of specific sections of the Copyright Act and a concept of “vigilante interoperability”.

Not today, Conroy: House of Reps rejects NBN transparency reform

27
The Government has used its dominance of the House of Representatives to reject amendments successfully moved by Labor Senator Stephen Conroy in the Senate which would enforce a degree of radical transparency on the NBN company.

Fact Check: Is ridesharing no safer than hitchhiking?

5
The claim that ridesharing is no safer than hitchhiking is not supported by empirical data. Much of the data used by critics of Uber rely on anecdotal data and media reports to support their view ridesharing puts passengers at personal risk.

Foxtel to launch first Internet piracy blocking attempt in early 2016

13
National pay TV operator Foxtel has reportedly confirmed plans to launch an attempt early in the near year to have a specific website allegedly hosting pirated film and TV content blocked, in what is expected to be the first test of new legislation designed to tackle Internet piracy.

Telstra “unable” to sell South Brisbane FTTP to NBN Co

37
Negotiations appear to have broken down over the planned sale of Telstra’s Fibre to the Premises network in South Brisbane to the NBN company, with the Government stating that Telstra has been “unable” to reach an agreement for the infrastructure to become part of the National Broadband Network.

Fact check: Turnbull misleads Q&A audience on NBN

271
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull appears to have misled the ABC's Q&A program about key facts regarding the National Broadband Network project, repeating a set of common misconceptions about the initiative in response to a question on air last night.

ACT Liberals call for driverless vehicle trials

1
The ACT Liberals have released an exposure draft of legislation which would facilitate driverless vehicle trials in the Australian Capital Territory.

Coalition faces internal e-safety dissent

3
Remember how the new Coalition Federal Government issued a detailed discussion paper in mid-January canvassing various options through which it can deal with the issue of children’s safety on the Internet, including the potential establishment of a children’s e-safety commissioner? Of course you do. Well, now Malcolm Turnbull’s Parliamentary Secretary Paul Fletcher, who is spearheading the policy, is facing opposition from a new front: Coalition MPs.

NSW announces Opal app top ups, credit card “tap in” trial

4
The NSW Government has announced that customers using its Opal smartcard ticketing system for public transport services can now top up via its "new and improved" Opal Travel app. Also announced were 2017 trials of a scheme that would allow commuters to tap "contactless" credit and debit cards as an alternative to the Opal card.

Turnbull will abandon FTTN copper for FTTdp, says Clare

147
Malcolm Turnbull's Coalition Government will "ditch" its plans to deploy Fibre to the Node infrastructure over Telstra's copper network prior to the 2016 Election and instead focus on deploying fibre to the 'distribution point' or driveway of premises on the National Broadband Network, the Opposition said yesterday.

Will the green shoots of Australian innovation policy be cut off prematurely?

2
Understandably, new governments have an interest in putting their own stamp on policy, particularly in areas as critical to our future as research and innovation, but sometimes continuity and re-badging is preferable to scorched earth.

50Mbps good enough for ‘ten years’, says NBN’s Morrow

148
The chief executive of the NBN company, Bill Morrow, has stated in several comments over the past month that the 50Mbps base speeds which the company is aiming for across much of its network will be good enough "for the forseeable future" -- ten years after the NBN is initially built.

Delimiter has been approved to join the Press Gallery in Canberra

24
I just wanted to drop readers a brief note to let you know that yesterday I was approved to join the Federal Parliamentary Press Gallery in Canberra.

Labor files formal complaint alleging NBN breach of Caretaker Conventions

47
The Opposition has reported filed a formal complaint with the Secretary of Malcolm Turnbull's Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet over what it said was a "clear breach" by the NBN company of the Caretaker Conventions which require it to remain impartial during the election period.

Govt open to NBN using skinny fibre, FTTdp, says Fifield

29
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has confirmed the Government is open to using 'skinny' fibre and Fibre to the Distribution Point models as part of the National Broadband Network, as speculation continues to mount the two technologies may form the basis of a new Coalition NBN policy to be released ahead of this year's Federal Election.

Government releases privacy impact assessment for face-matching scheme

0
The government has released a preliminary Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) for the National Facial Biometric Matching Capability – a face-matching scheme that is aimed to help government agencies combat identity crime, organised crime and terrorism.

“National security matter”: Third agency caught unilaterally blocking web sites

51
The Federal Government has acknowledged that a third agency, beyond ASIC and the Australian Federal Police, has been using the Telecommunications Act to unilaterally block certain websites, with bureaucrats refusing to disclose which agency was involved, apart from stating that the issue was "a national security matter".

Australia extends global Internet piracy lead

29
Australia has dramatically extended its lead over other countries when it comes to the levels of Australians pirating popular US television shows, according to new statistics released overnight by TorrentFreak, with the limited availability of such content in Australia believed to be driving the trend.

Key commentators agree the NBN should be broken up, sold off

53
Several influential commentators on the National Broadband Network have publicly agreed over the past several days with Infrastructure Australia's recommendation that the NBN company should be broken up into chunks along technological lines and privatised.

Stephen Conroy announces retirement from Senate

0
Labor Senator Stephen Conroy has made the surprise announcement that he is to retire from Senate later this month.

Telstra fixes first blackspots under government program

3
Telstra has made the first improvements to regions with poor mobile coverage as part of the government's Mobile Black Spot Programme.

Victoria reveals board members for startup booster LaunchVic

0
The Victorian Government has announced the board members of its new $60 million startup launch pad, LaunchVic, which is aimed to help accelerate startups, drive new ideas and create jobs in the state.

UK Govt flies Aussie tech startups to London in open bid to nick Aussie...

2
So it's come to this. Other first-world countries are pushing so hard to attract lucrative technology startups to their shores to grow their own digital economies that they are actually paying to fly Australian entrepreneurs overseas to check out the local scene.

Two years later, NBN Co finally launches FTTN

35
The NBN company today took a major step towards its goal of implementing the Multi-Technology Mix approach which Malcolm Turnbull has brought to the project, formally launching its Fibre to the Node product as an option to retail broadband providers some two years after the 2013 Federal Election.

While the Coalition was tearing itself into marriage equality knots, Labor was partying with...

4
Last night, while Coalition MPs debated marriage equality in a small room in Parliament House for six hours straight, tech-focused Labor MPs Jason Clare and Ed Husic flew to Melbourne and were partying on, Silicon Valley-style.

Fifield leaves door open for greater NBN FTTP rollout

34
Senator Mitch Fifield appears to have opened the door for the NBN company to change its percentage mix of broadband technologies, in his first interview since being sworn in as Malcolm Turnbull’s replacement Communications Minister on Monday this week.

The Australian newspaper launches election attack on Labor’s NBN

191
Murdoch-owned newspaper The Australian has published a pre-emptive article strongly attacking Labor's new National Broadband Network policy, but without including any new information and despite the fact that the policy itself has yet to be released.

NSW Govt launches 10 year eHealth strategy

1
The New South Wales Government has launched a 10-year eHealth strategy, saying it will bring "smart, safe, sustainable and digitally-enabled care" to patients.

Ludlam demands clarity on GST Internet filter report

0
The Australian Greens have demanded that the Government clarify its stance on a reported new policy that would see it block foreign sites not paying Goods and services Tax (GST) on sales in Australia.

Immigration Dept creates innovation division to drive digital transformation

2
The Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) has formed an innovation division to help accelerate the pace of its digital transformation.

Reality check: Piracy is not killing Australian film

28
Imagine a world where you can only consume culture from government-approved sources, months after its widely publicised release overseas, in low definition, with long term lease agreements where you can never purchase a copy to own, only to borrow and use within a specific set of technologically locked parameters. Where the freedom to share or own copies of cultural works has finally been stamped out and middlemen are free to charge what they like for mediocre services and innovation is locked in a box then dropped into an ocean abyss.

Pirate Party comes fourth in Griffith

19
The Australian division of digital rights group the Pirate Party has taken fourth place in the Griffith by-election held in Brisbane over the weekend, in a result that placed the party ahead of other minor parties such as the Katter Australian Party and Family First.

Parliament announces yet another inquiry into Australian innovation

0
The Australian Parliament’s Trade and Investment Growth Committee has announced a new innovation inquiry, despite a similar and rather delayed inquiry being due to report just next week.

Truth: Will NBN Co be rolling brand new copper in some places to deal...

102
The NBN company has recently been putting out conflicting messages about what it will do when faced with sections of Telstra’s copper network which are too degraded to use for Fibre to the Node. But when you did a bit deeper, the truth is that the company appears to have a preference towards remediation or even replacement of the copper rather than upgrading it with fibre.

Vodafone urges voters to appeal for more mobile black spot funding

6
In a new campaign, Vodafone is calling on voters in regional seats to use social media to raise the "urgent need" for more funding for mobile black spots with their federal representatives and candidates ahead of the coming 2 July election.

Police want “indefinite” data retention

12
According to the ABC and a plethora of other media outlets reporting from parliamentary hearings yesterday Australia's friendly police want data retention laws extended to cover a period lasting ... forever.

NAB’s Bitcoin ban a symptom of the digital currency threat

9
Virtual currency Bitcoin is not a subject that ever draws neutral reactions. Against those who see the radical possibilities of a frictionless payment system designed for the internet, there is a growing resistance to the currencies that threaten existing business models and the perceived traceability of our current currency systems.

Melbourne Cup corruption agency demands metadata access

7
Victoria's Attorney-General Martin Pakula has written to Federal Attorney-General George Brandis requesting that the state's Racing Integrity Commissioner -- which oversees the Melbourne Cup and other races -- be given access to Australians' telecommunications metadata.

“Criminal”: MyRepublic CEO mourns loss of Australia’s “marvellous” NBN vision

146
feature The chief executive officer of upstart telco MyRepublic has described the Coalition’s move to significantly water down Labor’s National Broadband Network vision as...

Greens call for public surveillance inquiry

6
The Greens have called for the Federal Parliament to hold a wide-ranging inquiry into Australia's electronic surveillance efforts, as pressure grows on the nation's intelligence agencies to come clean on their covert activities in a manner similar to which is being seen internationally, and revelations by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden continue to create aftershocks in Australia.

Bitcoin miner lists on ASX

3
If you needed any further indication that we now live in the science fiction future long ago mapped out for us by visionary authors, then look no further. News arrived this week that an Australian digital currency company and Bitcoin mining concern, digitalBTC, has listed on the Australian Stock Exchange through a backdoor listing.

NBN: Disastrous for the music industry … really?

24
The time has come for the music industry to find common ground with consumers, not do business in spite of them.

Govt releases geocoded national address and boundaries datasets

2
The Federal Government has released PSMA Australia’s Geocoded National Address File (G-NAF) and associated Administrative Boundaries dataset to the public.

AFR claims on NBN sale just plain “wrong”, says Fifield

123
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield today flatly rejected claims by the Financial Review newspaper that the Government was in talks to sell the bulk of the National Broadband Network to Telstra for as little as $20 billion, stating: "There are no plans to sell NBN".

Netflix speeds show Turnbull’s NBN is “flatlining”, says Labor

34
The latest Netflix ISP Speed Index shows that Australia's Internet speeds are "flatlining" and demonstrates the need for a "proper" National Broadband Network, Labor has said.

Australia slips in global broadband rankings again

33
Australia has taken another step in the wrong direction down the global rankings of countries with the best broadband, with the latest report by technology giant Akamai showing average broadband speeds in Australia actually decreasing and the nation slipping behind neighbours such as New Zealand and even Thailand.

StartupAUS report: Australian big business must collaborate with startup community

1
StartupAUS, a group that advocates for Australia's startups, has published a report highlighting the importance of the relationship between big business and startups in cultivating a "vibrant and energetic" environment for innovation.

Coalition dumps satellite for FTTN NBN for Tasmania’s west coast

50
In a change from its previous commitment, the Coalition Government has announced that it will abandon the satellite broadband rollout on the west coast of Tasmania and instead deploy fibre to the node (FTTN) via the NBN.

Pirate Party to contest Rudd’s seat

1
The Pirate Party Australia has signalled it will contest the Griffith by-election for the seat of formr Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, in another sign that the party which has achieved electoral success in Europe on digital rights and civil liberties issues is increasingly serious about gaining a higher slice of the popular vote in Australia.

Truth: We’re building an NBN that only a mother could love

118
The reality that is becoming increasingly apparent is that the MTM – or, more specifically, its emphasis on trying to breathe life into a dog's breakfast of creaking old and unproven new technologies – is going to cost nearly as much as the original FTTP plan and do nothing at all to improve Australia's broadband to anything that can be called remotely 'world-class'.

Disruptive tech companies killing off workers’ rights, says union

7
The 'disruptive economy' being brought about by companies such as Uber is "driving down" workers’ rights, the Transport Workers Union has warned.

Truth: A Labor Government will not roll back data retention

5
Those holding out hope that a Bill Shorten Labor administration would wind back the Orwellian Data Retention laws that Labor and the Coalition waved through Parliament last year should give up now: All indications are that Data Retention is here to stay.

NBN company re-writes blog post to clarify copper condition

36
The NBN company appears to have slightly reworked a blog post it published yesterday defending the state of the copper network it is buying from Telstra, in effect removing its claim that it had not had to replace any copper to ensure the Coalition’s Fibre to the Node technology functioned correctly.

StartupAUS says Turnbull’s funding pledge welcome but “modest”

3
Not-for-profit advocacy group StartupAUS has said that, while the Coalition Government's pledge to provide a further $15 million for the startup sector is good news, the funding would be "far from sufficient".

Most Australians now support MTM NBN, claims Morrow

125
The chief executive of the NBN company last week said that the debate over different technologies for the National Broadband Network was effectively over, with 'most' Australians having now accepted the rationale for the Coalition's technically inferior Multi-Technology Mix model for the network.

Devil’s Advocate: Why brand new copper is great news for new estates

47
Rolling out brand new copper to greenfields estates will help residents in those areas get broadband quicker (or at all) and pave the way for easy future upgrades. What's not to like?

Fifield denies Turnbull asked NBN Co to create “distorted” info to attack FTTP

9
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has rejected a claim by the Opposition that Malcolm Turnbull asked the NBN company to generate “distorted” information to help the Coalition attack Labor’s previous Fibre to the Premises approach to the NBN.

DTO’s Digital Marketplace enters beta stage

3
The Digital Transformation Office's (DTO) Digital Marketplace has now reached the Beta stage of its development, according to a DTO blog post.

NBN CEO won’t talk South Brisbane, TransACT

40
The chief executive of the NBN company has flatly refused to comment on contentious situations with relation to the company's rollout in the South Brisbane and Canberra areas, where it appears to be overbuilding existing open access high-speed broadband infrastructure.

Mobile blackspot nominations deadline extended

3
The government has announced that the deadline for public nominations for Round 2 of the Mobile Black Spot Programme has been extended from 31 December 2015 to 15 January 2016.

NBN Co shifts 40k premises to fixed wireless to free up satellite capacity

11
The NBN company today revealed it planned to deploy its fixed wireless network to an additional 40,000 premises previously slated to receive satellite broadband, as part of an effort to free up capacity on the satellite network to meet its aim of a 150GB monthly download quota.

Labor reshuffle sees Husic take on startups, Rowland lose Communications

3
A portfolio reshuffle announced by Opposition Leader Bill Shorten this afternoon has brought both good and bad news for Australia’s technology community, with tech-focused MP Ed Husic taking on additional responsibilities for digital innovation and startups, but Michelle Rowland losing her Assistant Minister role in the Communications portfolio.

Labor backs Govt’s new Joint NBN Committee

0
The Federal Government has formed a joint standing committee that will oversee the rollout of the National Broadband Network until it is completed, likely in 2020.

Election FactCheck Q&A: has the NBN been delayed?

56
Christopher Pyne’s assertion that there have been “no delays” in the implementation of the NBN is inaccurate.

Short-lived: Six months killed two hyped startups

1
Two of Australia's most hyped Internet startups have shut their doors just six months after launching or taking investment, in a sign of how quickly events move in the rapidly evolving local technology ecosystem.

After Quigley, the silence is deafening

178
On Wednesday night, one man stood up for the truth. My hope is that eventually that number will swell to many.

Assange’s mum confirms he will run for Senate

16
Julian Assange's mum has confirmed he will run for the Australian Senate in this year's Federal Election, claiming that he will be "awesome".

Govt seeks substantial boost to surveillance powers

24
The Federal Government today revealed a wide-reaching program to substantially reform its telecommunications interception and surveillance powers with the aim of bolstering the ability of law enforcement organisations to fight crime, including the introduction of a so-called "data retention" scheme that has attracted a great deal of controversy in Australia under the 'OzLog' banner.

Government role in NBN needs “re-evaluation”, says US think tank

140
The Technology Policy Institute, a US-based think tank, has published a paper on the NBN concluding that, while the network was set up to increase competition in the broadband sector, as well as boost quality and lower prices, it has evolved into a "intrusive policy subject to political pressures".

Winning DataStart entry uses data to maximise healthcare efficiency

0
The winner of the DataStart incubator program has been named as CohortIQ – a startup that aims to use government and private data to maximise hospital and public health service efficiency.

CSIRO job cuts a ‘body blow to science’, says union

5
The Community and Public Sector Union has strongly criticised the federal government over the "mass axing" of 350 more scientists at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation.

“Extraordinary”: Telcos slam Turnbull’s Dept for backing Telstra over consumers

23
A group of major Australian telcos have issued a fiery statement damning Malcolm Turnbull’s Department of Communications for its “extraordinary” attempt to support Telstra’s profitability and keep telecommunications prices from dropping.

Turnbull’s Dept says ACCC could delay NBN migrations

18
A war of words has erupted between the ACCC and Malcolm Turnbull’s Department of Communications, with the department claiming a pricing decision by the regulator has the potential to delay Australians migrating to next-generational National Broadband Network infrastructure.

Labor colleagues pay tribute to “visionary” Conroy

0
Labor politicians from across Australia have paid tribute to the Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate and longtime Victorian Senator, Stephen Conroy who announced his retirement from politics on Thursday.

Devil’s Advocate: Is the political innovation obsession a giant waste of money?

4
Eventually we'll look on this madness the same way as we did the first technology bubble: Unsustainable hype. It'll be a great party while it lasts, fuelled by billions of dollars in taxpayer money. But eventually it'll all come crashing down.

Turnbull appointee Adcock to leave NBN in search of greater challenge

9
One of the most high-profile executives appointed shortly after Malcolm Turnbull became Communications Minister has signalled he plans to depart the NBN company in search of greater challenges.

Telstra Health will hold Australians’ cancer details, so we need to ensure their privacy...

9
Clearly, the cancer screening registry contract is only the first of the potential outsourcing of health programs. It creates a precedent that needs to be right.

Productivity Commission to conduct USO inquiry

21
The Federal Government has asked the Productivity Commission to conduct an inquiry into the telecoms industry's Universal Service Obligation (USO) that will examine the "role and relevance" of the arrangements in today's "evolving market".

Fibre speeds “amazing”, but Bernardi slams “hopeless” NBN installers

43
Conservative Liberal Senator Cory Bernardi has labelled the performance of his his new National Broadband Network fibre connection as “quite amazing”, but has slammed the NBN company for a bungled installation which required repeated visits to get the connection running.

New policy: Labor would dump FTTN for FTTP, keep HFC

146
The Opposition today released a new National Broadband Network policy for the Federal Election, with Labor committing to dumping the Coalition's Fibre to the Node plans and supporting Fibre to the Premises instead, but keeping the other HFC cable, satellite and wireless aspects of the current plan.

After 16 years, Microsoft finally exits ninemsn

5
Sixteen years after the founding of the company during the first dot-com boom, global technology giant Microsoft has finally revealed plans to sell its 50 percent stake in online venture ninemsn, with television partner Nine to take full control of the joint venture.

Election: Pirate Party vows to “fight tirelessly” for a free Internet

1
Pirate Party Australia has announced that digital rights will be central to its 2016 Federal Election campaign and that it will to "fight tirelessly" for a free Internet.

“No evidence” Aussie banks boycotting Apple Pay, claims RBA Governor

9
Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Glenn Stevens has claimed in a letter to a Labor MP that he has not seen "any evidence" that Australia's major banks are actively boycotting the Apple Pay mobile payments service, despite the fact that only American Express has signed up to the service in Australia.

Disaster in the making? Govt embarks on mammoth IT shared services scheme

13
The Federal Government has issued a landmark discussion paper seeking industry and other stakeholder opinions on how it can best implement a strategic shared services scheme to serve the needs of its departments and agencies, despite the fact that this very same model has abjectly failed several Australian State Governments over the past half-decade and been abandoned.

Truth: No, Labor will not be returning to a full FTTP NBN model

19
If you believe what you read, the Australian Labor Party plans to ditch Malcolm Turnbull's Fibre to the Node technology and shift the NBN back to a full Fibre to the Premises model if it wins the next Federal Election. However, the truth is a great deal more complicated than the headlines would suggest.

“Large ISP” (TPG?) refuses to deploy Interpol filter

48
The Australian Federal Police has revealed that its limited mandatory ISP filtering scheme based on a list of offensive sites supplied by Interpol has not yet been taken up by most of Australia's ISPs, with only Telstra and Optus having implemented the filter so far and a further "large ISP" having flat out refused to comply with the project.

Shorten promises “greater role” for FTTP in NBN if Labor wins election

78
Bill Shorten this week said Labor would make sure that there would be a "greater role" for Fibre to the Premises technology in the National Broadband Network if it won the upcoming Federal Election. However, the Opposition Leader also intimated Labor wouldn't be able to reverse the changes Malcolm Turnbull has made to the project.

AUSTRAC tracks every AUD-Bitcoin conversion

5
The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) admitted in a Senate Estimates session in Canberra this week that it is literally tracking every conversion between Bitcoins and Australian dollars. Wow. Talk about privacy-invasive.

What will the National Broadband Network really cost?

27
It’s worth looking more closely at cost difference between FTTP and FTTN to see if the claimed A$84 billion to A$56 billion maximum cost comparison stacks up, and see where Labor’s new half-way solution sits.

NBN Co doubles coverage, user base over past year

12
The NBN company has doubled the amount of premises it serves and the number of end user customers actually connected to its network over the past year, the company announced this morning, as the deployment of its broadband network around Australia continues to proceed.

Kim Dotcom may list Mega on ASX

0
Kim Dotcom expresses an interest in listing his new Mega business on the Australian Stock Exchange.

Turnbull NBN advisor leaves key facts out of MTM defence

140
An influential advisor to Malcolm Turnbull has published a spirited defence of the Coalition's controversial Multi-Technology Mix approach to the NBN, but without including key facts which show a stark difference between the MTM model and similar policies in comparable countries.

Cinema execs blame piracy for $20 ticket prices

43
If you've attended an Australian cinema recently, you'll be aware that $20 ticket prices are now a thing. If you just hit up a film every couple of weeks and avoid the cinema's high-priced junk food aisle (your writer habitually goes to Woolworths for some snacks beforehand), then this mark may not seem like such a huge deal. But if you throw a family into the mix, a night out at the movies can now seem a little too exorbitant for many. According to several cinema executives, one of the central reasons for the ongoing price increases is Internet piracy.

Turnbull backs Ziggy’s decision to breach Caretaker Conventions

40
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull this morning said he respected Ziggy Switkowski's decision to ignore the Caretaker Conventions during the Election Campaign, and added that the NBN chairman was doing a "remarkable job" with the company.

Telstra says Govt policy forcing it to deploy brand new copper instead of fibre

68
The nation's largest telco Telstra today said regulatory decisions made by the Government were forcing it to install brand new copper in new greenfields estates, rather than the next-generation fibre-optic cables which many Australians would expect in new developments.

NBN raises possibility of multi-gigabit symmetric HFC speeds

218
NBN could soon roll out symmetric multi-gigabit broadband via the HFC network following developments announced by CableLabs, the US consortium that sets standards for cable technology.

Labor, Coalition vote against strong encryption in Senate

16
Both of Australia's major political parties have explicitly rejected a Senate motion calling on the Government to support public use of strong encryption technologies, in a move that comes in the wake of the US Government's demand that Apple provide it with a backdoor for open access to its iPhone handset.

The Foxtel-BBC deal: Implications for Australian television and content

14
The ABC’s 50-year TV partnership with the BBC is at breaking point after a landmark deal between the British broadcaster and pay TV provider Foxtel was announced last week.

Not a “flop”: Hunt defends Turnbull’s innovation push

11
Newly appointed Minister for Innovation, Industry and Science Greg Hunt has defended the government's emphasis on innovation after its Federal Election campaigning on the issue was described as a "flop".

Michelle Rowland appointed Shadow Minister for Communications

19
Labor MP Michelle Rowland has been appointed to the Shadow Cabinet, taking on the role of Shadow Minister for Communications.

Will Australia’s digital divide – fast for the city, slow in the country –...

16
As the Productivity Commission grapples with the question of what the USO should look like in 2016 it will really need to consider what it should look like in a decade or two. This question will challenge the Commission’s rationalist economic predilections.

DFAT blocks media from public TPP briefing

16
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has taken the extraordinary step of rescinding confirmations of attendance for journalists who had registered to attend a public briefing on the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement in Sydney today, stating that the meeting is “off-the-record”, and that journalists are not welcome.”

Electoral silence on digital rights from both politicians and journalists

1
We’ve had #stopthenotes, #suppositories, and #sexappeal to keep us amused, but since the election campaign period began there has been very limited reporting in the mainstream media (MSM) of the electoral relevance of the digital rights issues faced by Australian citizens.

How to keep more girls in IT at schools if we’re to close the...

9
The world is increasingly embracing digital technology, and so too are our schools. But many girls are still missing out on developing IT and programming skills.

Coalition failed to resource NDIA properly, PwC report finds

4
A new report by 'Big Four' auditor PwC has levelled criticism at the Coalition Government over failures in the way it resourced the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) and cast doubt on its ability to transition to full service.

Richard Branson tells Turnbull OneWeb satellites could save Australian broadband

7
Just when you thought Australia's broadband scene couldn't get any more absurd, along comes something which breaks the mold yet again.

iiNet pulls out of anti-piracy scheme

58
Remember how a coalition of most of Australia’s major ISPs proposed a scheme about a year ago which would see Australians issued with warning and educational notices if they were caught pirating content online? The one which could have seen users’ details handed over to the copyright lobby with a subpoena? Well, it’s looking increasingly like the scheme is dead in the water.

NBN goes to market for FTTdp hardware

37
The NBN company has gone to market to purchase 'Fibre to the Distribution Point' (FTTdp) hardware that will allow it to deploy fibre further out into its growing Fibre to the Node network, as speculation increases that Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will formalise a widespread FTTdp rollout ahead of this year's Federal Election.

Australians massive Internet pirates, says Turnbull research

38
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull this morning released research which shows that about a quarter of Australian Internet users pirated Internet content, in a joint effort with the UK Government aimed at displaying the need for international and industry cooperation to tackle the issue.

Internet piracy code stalls on costs

4
Three months after the deadline set by Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, the telecommunications and content industries are still deadlocked on who will pay for the cost of administering their co-developed industry code to deal with Internet piracy.

“Political indecision” leaving Australia a broadband backwater: ex-NBN CTO

158
The NBN company's first chief technology officer this week said that the protracted disagreement between Australia's two major political parties on how to best upgrade broadband networks was leaving Australia languishing in global broadband rankings, despite several obvious ways forward.

Lucy Turnbull backs scheme to turn kids into entrepreneurs

1
Lucy Turnbull AO, wife of the Prime Minister, has become patron of an organisation called DICE Kids, which aims to turn Australia's kids into entrepreneurs.

Privacy Foundation outlines ‘major concerns’ with opt-out e-Health scheme

0
The Australian Privacy Foundation (APF) has aired “major concerns” with the Personally Controlled eHealth Record (PCEHR) system and the government's proposals to make it an ‘opt-out’ scheme.

The Inside Track: New CVC model is NBN’s attempt to fix congestion issues

19
The new CVC pricing model announced by the NBN company this morning is at least partially an attempt to fix the peak hour congestion issues being experienced by early Fibre to the Node users. But only time will tell whether the attempt will succeed.

“Fantasy fibre”: Coalition explicitly rejects NBN FTTdp model

57
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has broken cover to openly slam a Fibre to the Distribution Point (FTTdp) model for the National Broadband Network, in the first explicit sign that the Coalition will not substantially modify its NBN model for the Federal Election.

‘Mining-hating’ Greens should give up their smartphones for clay tablets, says Canavan

11
We've seen some pretty wild demands made in the Federal Parliament, but this one probably takes the cake ... at least for this week. Queensland LNP Senator Matt Canavan has accused the Australian Greens of being hypocrites for simultaneously having concerns about Australia's mining sector while also using smartphones which use minerals in their manufacture.

Even Telstra is not complying with the Data Retention legislation

6
Given that the Government's Data Retention legislation passed the Parliament some seven months ago, you would expect that Attorney-General George Brandis and his merry band at the Attorney-General's Department would have at least gotten all their ducks in a row at the nation's biggest Telstra. I mean, it would be an embarassment of epic proportions if even Telstra -- a multi-billion-dollar telco giant with about a million IT professionals on hand to help it with the implementation -- couldn't get this thing done. Right? Right?

NBN leaks: AFP raids Conroy’s office, Labor staffers’ houses

65
Australian Federal Police officers have raided the Melbourne office of former Communications Minister Stephen Conroy and the houses of two Labor staffers seeking to ascertain the identity of whistleblowers who have leaked a series of key documents from within the NBN company.

Assange to get asylum in Ecuador

34
Australian citizen and Wikileaks founder Julian Assange will shortly be granted asylum in Ecuador, according to the UK's Guardian newspaper.

Delimiter files FOI request for Data Retention agency ‘scope creep’ requests

2
Technology media outlet Delimiter today filed a Freedom of Information request for letters from public sector departments and agencies who are seeking to be added to the list of agencies authorised to access retained metadata under the Government's controversial Data Retention legislation.

Turnbull has “no-one else to blame”, Labor says on NBN cost blow-outs

36
The Opposition has blamed the up to $15 billion National Broadband Network funding blow-out revealed this morning on “poor decisions” and “wrong assumptions” made by Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull during his stewardship of the project, as the war of words between the major parties on the issue ramps up.

Could Turnbull truly become the “Earl” of Wentworth?

18
Seasoned Delimiter readers will know that your writer is fond of gently teasing Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull over his aristocratic bearing, by use of several honorifics. At times we have dubbed the Liberal MP 'the Duke of Double Bay', 'the Viscount of Vaucluse' and so on. But by far the most common title we have awarded to Turnbull has been one that made it onto the floors of Parliament this week.

Private telcos ‘most cost effective’ for public safety mobile broadband

9
Private telecommunications firms are the most cost-effective option for delivering mobile broadband to public safety agencies, according to a Productivity Commission report.

“They don’t get it”: Huston slams “Village Idiot” approach on Data Retention

22
Global Internet networks expert Geoff Huston this week said Australia was at risk of being positioned as the “Global Village Idiot” courtesy of the Data Retention legislation passed by the “bureaucrats” in the Government, alleging that none of the organisations in support of the policy actually understand technology.

AFP arrests two alleged ‘Anonymous’ members

7
The Australian Federal Police this morning revealed it had arrested two Australian men who it alleged were members of the loose-knit confederation of Internet activists who self-organise under the banner "Anonymous", claiming that the pair were involved in "a campaign targeting Australian and international websites".

Labor has 60 complaints from congested FTTN users who want their ADSL back

181
The Opposition said this week that it has received about 60 complaints from early adopters of the Government's preferred Fibre to the Node NBN rollout model, many of whom were receiving such poor service that they would prefer to have their original ADSL broadband back.

Victorian Govt outlines new IT strategy

0
The Victorian Government has launched a new four-year strategy aimed to harness new digital technologies to "deliver modern services for the community".

DTO broadens consultation as GOV.AU problems bite

3
The Federal Government's Digital Transformation Office has broadened its consultation process around the prototype of its centralised GOV.AU platform, as concerns continue to circulate within the public sector that the model has substantial problems.

Sexism and douche-baggery in the hackersphere

28
Australian online technology activist Asher Wolf slams elements of the hackersphere which she says have been demonstrating sexism.

It’s on: Foxtel to meet IPTV challenge head-on

41
Most of Australia's younger generation of Internet-focused media consumers probably think Pay TV giant Foxtel is merely a blast from the past; a mouldering old dinosaur with no tricks left up its sleeve. But if revelations by the company last week are any indication, Foxtel 'gets' the Internet and has exactly the right moves planned to tackle it.

Greens will legislate to dismiss fines and preserve census ‘snapshot’

2
Following both protests over privacy and the failure of the Census website on 9 August, the Australian Greens have said they plan to introduce legislation aimed to ensure that people "acting to protect their privacy" and unable to complete the census will not be fined.

“Maddening, dispiriting, radically unbalanced”: A full legal analysis of the TPP leaks

4
In Australian intellectual property circles, there are few names which are more respected than that of Kimberlee Weatherall. That’s why we were personally thrilled to learn that Weatherall has recently published a mammoth blow by blow analysis of the enforcement provisions contained in the recently leaked draft of the Trans-Pacific Partnership IP chapter.

Forget it: Turnbull won’t return the NBN to a FTTP model

55
Prime Minister or not, there is simply no way that Malcolm Turnbull is going to reverse five years of bitter campaigning and return the National Broadband Network to its previous near-universal Fibre to the Premises model. So let’s give up hope on that misguided delusion right now and save ourselves a great deal of painful mental anguish.

Twitter caves to Conroy’s troll pressure

24
news Global social networking site Twitter has agreed to closer cooperation with Australian law enforcement authorities, including handing over users’ IP addresses in certain...

Fifield misleads Senate on Labor’s NBN policy history

74
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield appears to have this afternoon inadvertently misled the Senate regarding the history of the Labor Party's National Broadband Network policy, falsely alleging that the party had not considered re-using existing network infrastructure during the development of the policy.

Defence kicks off SAP-based ‘largest’ ERP project in Australia’s public sector

8
The Department of Defence has officially kicked off what it describes as the "largest ERP program implementation of its kind in Australian Government", in a SAP-based initiative that will see several thousand business applications consolidated down sharply.

EFA kicks off digital rights campaign for election year

3
Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) has launched its digital rights campaign for 2016, which addresses issues such as privacy, censorship and net neutrality.

Hope for Ludlam as WA recount confirmed

1
The electoral fate of Greens Senator and Communications Spokesperson Scott Ludlam is likely to hang in the balance for some time yet, following confirmation yesterday by the Australian Electoral Commission that it would conduct a partial recount of the Western Australian Senate vote in the Federal Election.

Budde says Turnbull may announce FTTdp as NBN election policy

138
Veteran telco analyst Paul Budde this week said it was his view that the speed and cost advantages of the NBN's new Fibre to the Distribution Point (FTTdp) model might lead Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to announce it as the Coalition's new NBN policy ahead of this year's Federal Election.

Uber is blocking Qld Govt inspectors from using its service … because it can

9
According to the Brisbane Times, Uber is fighting back against regulation by ... blocking the Queensland Government's inspectors from booking its services and thus being able to fine its drivers.

Defying the Federal Police: iiNet refuses to implement Interpol filter

22
National broadband player iiNet today revealed it had not implemented the Federal Government’s limited mandatory ISP filtering scheme based on a list of offensive sites supplied by Interpol and had no immediate plans to do so, in a move which appears to represent a total reversal of the ISP's position on the matter and defiance of the Australian Federal Police's wishes.

Quickflix lets users buy TV shows, including Game of Thrones

19
One of the disadvantages of an online IPTV service such as Quickflix is that up until now, you haven't been able to buy distinct television shows through the service to own permanently; users have only been able to get access to the shows they want if they're paying a monthly subscription. However, all this is set to change, according to a media release issued by Quickflix today.

Fibre optic broadband to last 50 years, says Budde

94
While technology is generally advancing at a furious pace, fibre optic broadband has nothing that is likely to replace it for as much as 50 years, telecoms expert Paul Budde has said.

Copyright Review will be published by March

20
The Attorney-General's Department has stated that it believes the Government has an obligation to publish by the end of February the full report which the Australian Law Reform Commission has painstakingly generated over the past several years into whether the Copyright Act is adequate to handle the new digital environment.

Dallas Buyers Club won’t appeal piracy ruling, but may still seek large damages

3
In essence, what we’re seeing here is that Dallas Buyers Club and Marque Lawyers have decided to more or less accept Justice Perram’s ruling, but may be seeking to reword their approach to alleged copyright infringers to still target them for facilitating uploading of content online (as occurs in a BitTorrent situation, for example), rather than merely targeting them for downloading material.

Turnbull appoints new Communications Department secretary

0
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has appointed a new Secretary of the Department of Communications and the Arts.

A cashless society and the five forms of mobile payment that will get us...

5
Visions of a cashless society started being portrayed from the 1950’s along with other aspects of a future waiting to be transformed by technology. That future has not yet arrived but it is now possible to exist without using cash on a daily basis. In fact, in a survey released this week, 25% of Australians claim not to use cash in a given month. In the US, 50% of Americans carry less than $20 in cash at any time.

They did it

28
From this day on, whenever Australian engineers are facing a tough task, they should look up into the skies and remind themselves of the power of the Australian mind. If Australian ingenuity can put such a hunk of incredibly complex communications infrastructure into orbit to serve our broadband needs, purely on the strength of some clear thinking and a lot of hard work, then we truly can do anything. And we will.

NBN raids an “attack on press freedom”, says media union

53
Australia's peak media union has described last night's Australian Federal Police raids as an "attack on press freedom", stating that the action by the NBN company and law enforcement represented a "disturbing new twist in pursuit of whistleblowers and legitimate public interest journalism".

US Chinese military charges a smokescreen for its own spying

3
In a surprising move, a US District Court has charged five members of the Chinese military with hacking six US companies to obtain commercial secrets over the last eight years. The move has been denounced by the Chinese government and the US Ambassador has been called to Beijing as a result.

The marvellously destructive power of the Internet:A rant by Mark Newton

7
You might have noticed that at Delimiter we love an epic rant, and as we've previously written, former Internode network engineer Mark Newton has form in this area. Whether it be on the issue of the Internet filter, the National Broadband Network or other topics, Newton is wonderfully unafraid to tell it like it is, and that's one reason we love him (in a platonic sense, of course).

Minister Fifield appears ignorant of NBN Optus HFC disaster

43
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has publicly reaffirmed his confidence in the fitness of Optus' HFC cable network for use as part of the National Broadband Network, in comments which appear to show that he has no knowledge of deep concerns by the NBN company itself that the network is unusable.

Anti-piracy laws will increase piracy, says Budde

22
It's no secret that a large percentage of the technology sector thinks that the current proposal by Federal Attorney-General George Brandis (pictured) to crack down on Internet piracy will have little impact, given that most such attempts in the fast have broadly failed, and the commonly held belief that commercial avenues represent the best way to handle the situation. However, some commentators feel things will go still further. Veteran telecommunications analyst Paul Budde wrote this morning on his blog that he expects the anti-piracy measures to actually increase piracy.

Happy nine month birthday, Classification Review. Time for Conroy’s filter to finally die?

10
Today is the nine month anniversary of the publication of the Classification Review, which readers may remembers as the key document which would guide the development of Labor's infamous mandatory Internet filter policy.

Google fails to delete Street View data again

3
The Australian branch of global search giant Google has written to the nation’s Privacy Commissioner admitting that it had found yet more examples of undeleted data which its Street View cards had collected over the past several years as they brushed past Australian Wi-Fi networks, in what marks Google’s third attempt so far to delete the illicit data it collected.

Foxtel is about to go after The Pirate Bay

17
Foxtel has indicated it will shortly take to the courts to use brand new legislation to have websites allegedly infringing copyright blocked, with analysis of the company’s public statements on the issue indicating that popular file-sharing site The Pirate Bay is likely to be one of the pay television giant’s first targets.

Australian Govt says hands tied on Assange

14
The Australian Government's hands are currently tied when it comes to the fate of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, Federal Attorney-General Nicola Roxon said last night, with the maverick Internet publisher's Australian citizenship mattering little in the scheme of Swedish legal process unless a formal extradition request was made to shift him out of the European Union.

Screwed: Australian PS4, Xbox One lack basic functionality

27
Are you one of those Australians who lined up at midnight to buy some of the first next-generation video game consoles to go on sale? Have you spent some time exploring your new PlayStation 4 or Xbox One? Then you would be aware that when it comes to Australian support for their new consoles, both Sony and Microsoft appear to have screwed Australians pretty badly.

Labor slams data retention funding “uncertainties”

0
The Labor Opposition has hit out at the way the Government handled grant assistance for companies falling under the remit of new data retention regulation.

ACMA proposes changes to spectrum rules to open up Internet of Things

0
The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is proposing changes to spectrum rules in order to allow Internet of Things (IoT) devices to 'talk' to each other.

Insight: HFC is the gap in all of Labor’s FTTP NBN promises

24
Bill Shorten's statements about the National Broadband Network this week show that the Opposition Leader either doesn't understand the fundamental basis of the Coalition's Multi-Technology Mix for the NBN, or that Labor is planning to retain the HFC component of the network.

NBN hits three million premises milestone

23
Just days after NBN Co's announcement revealing that it has reached over one million active users, the Government has announced another milestone, saying three million premises are now able to connect to the National Broadband Network.

Brandis threatens ISPs with “mandatory” piracy scheme

94
Attorney-General George Brandis has threatened to introduce legislation to deal with the issue of Internet piracy in Australia unless the ISP and content industries can agree on a voluntary industry code to deal with the issue.

NBN “exceeding targets”, says Government

7
The Federal Government has said that the National Broadband Network rollout is "exceeding its connection and financial targets", following the release of NBN Co’s latest full-year results.

What it means: Five key points from the Senate’s Digital Currency report

5
Last week the Senate Standing Committee on Economics handed down a detailed report following its inquiry into Australia’s emerging digital or crypto-currency sector. The release was hailed as a “watershed” moment for this financial technology — here’s why it matters, in five succinct points.

NBN Co rejects FOI request for basic FTTN modem details

94
The NBN company has flatly rejected a seemingly innocuous Freedom of Information request which sought to establish the specifications which Australians would need to meet in order to connect their end user hardware to its Fibre to the Node and Basement networks.

Union slams Telstra health records deal

6
The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) has criticised the Coalition Government for its decision to put a private company in charge of the management of confidential and highly sensitive health records for thousands of Australians.

Australian retailers online: Late to the party and much to do

6
Australian consumers are embracing digital commerce, but Australian retailers are failing to build long-term relationships with their customers online, according to new research.

Time to kill paper ballots? First, let’s look at the alternatives

21
The loss of the West Australian ballots is a serious breach of electoral integrity, and one that must be thoroughly investigated to identify what went wrong. But amidst all the party-driven hysteria, it’s important to remember that no system is entirely fail-safe, and the risks posed by electronic or internet voting are potentially far more serious than this isolated incident.

Web blocking technically impossible: iiNet reminds Govt of undisputed fact

0
National broadband provider iiNet has published a blog post reminding politicians of the fact undisputed by the global technology sector that the nature of the Internet makes it technically impossible to 'block' websites as currently being proposed by the Federal Government.

Labor, Coalition avoid data retention debate

15
Australia’s two major sides of politics have avoided substantially discussing the Federal Government’s controversial data retention and surveillance package, in a Senate debate stimulated yesterday by Greens Senator Scott Ludlam, who described the privacy issues involved as “deadly serious”.

Aussie email provider FastMail says it is exempt from Data Retention law

9
Australian email provider FastMail has claimed it will not be subject to the Data Retention law which is shortly scheduled to come into force in Australia, due to the fact that it is not a telecommunications carrier and does not operate hosting infrastructure in Australia.

Turnbull knows the MTM NBN won’t cut it, says Budde

66
Malcolm Turnbull deliberately kept the Coalition's Multi-Technology Mix from being mentioned in this week's National Innovation and Science Agenda because the Prime Minister knows the model won't meet Australia's innovation needs, veteran telecommunications analyst Paul Budde said this week.

Mass BitTorrent lawsuits return to the UK

4
Speculative invoicing might be returning to the UK, thanks to a High Court judgment Monday. The practice, all but abandoned in the UK in the wake of the ACS:Law fiasco, has restarted but with conditions. Meanwhile, over 9,000 people could get letters from the plaintiff, Ben Dover.

Author John Birmingham quits eBook DRM

3
Australian author John Birmingham dumps eBook DRM.

Website blocks, court orders, three strikes: Rights holders want it all

20
So you've seen the reports about Federal Attorney-General George Brandis resuscitating the failed talks between ISPs and content owners about the pesky problem of Internet piracy? Have you ever wondered what measures the rights-holders feel should be taken to address such issues? Fear not, industry publication Mumbrella has published an extensive article detailing their demands. And it appears they want rather a lot.

How the NBN could boost Australia’s GDP by 2 percent

19
This article is by Leith Campbell, Honorary Fellow, Melbourne School of Engineering and Sascha Suessspeck, Economist and Ph.D. Electronic and Electrical Engineering student, both...

Xenophon boycotts name details in census protest

17
Nick Xenophon, Independent Senator for South Australia, has said he will fight for the right to privacy by refusing to provide his name in the 2016 census, despite the risk of prosecution the protest will bring.

Copper rapidly losing ground to fibre in global broadband figures

20
IT market intelligence provider Point Topic has released new figures revealing that the numbers of people using fixed broadband globally climbed in the third quarter of 2015, with the numbers using copper-based technologies to connect taking a sharp downturn and fibre rapidly on the way up.

Back off, AFACT: Changing the law is not the answer

73
The Federal Government should ignore the pathetic demands of the film and TV industry for new legislation to "exterminate" Internet piracy and fix the blatantly obvious problems with its commercial model, following its latest loss in Australia's High Court. Australia's copyright law works well as it stands, and does not need changing.

Hockey pays “tribute” to Labor’s NBN project in final speech

24
One of the Coalition’s most vocal critics of the National Broadband Network, former Treasurer Joe Hockey, has used his final speech to Federal Parliament to praise the previous Labor Government for initiating the project, which he described as “a very significant commitment”.

Govt outlines guidelines for data retention grants

1
The government has initiated a grants program that will provide up to $128.4 million to assist the telecommunications industry with the upfront costs of meeting their data retention obligations.

Ruddock committee finds data retention may breach journalists’ rights

1
The Federal Parliament's human rights committee chaired by Liberal MP Philip Ruddock has found that the mechanisms in the recent data retention legislation for protecting journalists and their sources may be inadequate and may breach human rights covenants.

Calm down, Australian intelligence forces are just doing their job

1
Revelations about Australia’s alleged spy network in Asia and listening posts in our embassies across the Pacific might be diplomatically awkward. But it doesn’t mean intelligence agencies have “gone rogue”.

New tax incentives bill aimed to promote innovation and risk taking

7
The Federal Government introduced a new tax bill into Parliament yesterday that is aimed to drive investment, economic growth and job creation by "encouraging innovation, risk taking and an entrepreneurial culture".

Labor MP tables anti-TPP petition with over 300,000 signatures

21
An anti-Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) petition with over 300,000 signatures has been has tabled before Parliament by Labor MP Melissa Parke.

NBN board, Govt blocking FTTdp despite FTTN-like cost

78
The NBN company yesterday revealed its board and the Federal Government were blocking a switch to a Fibre to the Distribution Point model, despite the fact that new revelations have shown the cost of the FTTdp option is coming very close to that of the technically inferior Fibre to the Node incumbent model.

First NBN FTTN services switched on in South Australia

17
Minister for Communications Mitch Fifield has jointly announced that the first NBN fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) services have been switched-on in South Australia.

Watch Delimiter’s article on Turnbull read out in Parliament

20
As you may remember, when Malcolm Turnbull seized the Prime Ministership from Tony Abbott two weeks ago, I took the chance to publish an examination of the Member for Wentworth’s history leading the Communications Portfolio over the past five years for the Coalition. What you may not have known is that it was also mentioned on the floor of the House of Representatives.

“Aussies treated like second-class citizens”: Choice blasts US TV giants

21
Consumer watchdog Choice has issued a fiery statement accusing US content giants of giving Australians "a raw deal" when it comes to making television shows and films available in Australia, pointing out that Australians pay substantially more to access the same content and encouraging locals to use technical mechanisms to get around so-called "geo-blocking".

Queensland will be first to get NBN HFC cable, says Fifield

89
Minister for Communications Mitch Fifield has announced that residents in Queensland will be the first to experience the NBN's "superfast" HFC cable broadband service when the network goes live in June.

Wikileaks Party deregistered due to lack of members

5
The short-lived political party formed around Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been deregistered by the Australian Electoral Commission after it fell short of the requirement to have 500 registered members.

Truth: The MTM NBN could have been so much better

28
Everyone knows that Malcolm Turnbull's Multi-Technology Mess is an absolute dog of a model for the NBN. But every dog has its day, and the truth is that even the MTM could have been implemented so much better than it has been.

DTO immigration project passes first test

0
A new booking service being developed by the Digital Transformation Office (DTO) and the Department of Immigration and Border Protection for people about to take their citizenship test has passed its first assessment.

“Get on with it”: Ludlam tells Govt on data breach notification bill

4
Greens Deputy Leader and Senator Scott Ludlam has filed a Senate motion demanding the Government "get on with" its plans to introduce mandatory data breach legislation, pointing out that the concept had multi-partisan support and would be likely to pass Federal Parliament in quick order.

AFP raids Parliament House over NBN leaks

3
The Australian Federal Police (AFP) has confirmed a raid on Parliament House yesterday in relation to its investigation into the alleged unauthorised disclosure of Commonwealth information relating to NBN Co.

Morrow predicts “NBN Generation” by 2020

0
By 2020, NBN Co expects Australia will be "the first country of our size" to make broadband access universal, according to Bill Morrow, the firm's CEO.

“Pirating” UK student to be extradited to US

5
Richard O’Dwyer, the UK-based ex-administrator of the video linking website TVShack will be extradited to the US to face copyright infringement charges. Despite public outrage Home Secretary Theresa May approved the extradition order today. The 23-year-old student has never visited United States, but now faces several years in a US prison.

Alston successor Mitch Fifield is Australia’s new Communications Minister

10
Malcolm Turnbull has appointed veteran Senator Mitch Fifield to be Australia’s new Communications Minister as part of his new Cabinet, with the new Prime Minister’s former Parliamentary Secretary Paul Fletcher leaving the portfolio and current Attorney-General George Brandis to retain his role.

Apple blames rights holders for Aussie price hikes

4
Technology giant Apple has blamed copyright owners such as film and music studios for Australian price hikes on content sold through its iTunes digital store, despite politicians at the Parliament's IT price hike inquiry pointing out to the company that its size as the world's largest company by capitalisation gave it substantial market power.

Smacking down online piracy; does New Zealand know best?

29
We know online piracy exists; we know governments want to stop it – but what are the options?

It’s time to future-proof Australia’s copyright laws for the 21st century

4
The proposed reforms will enhance consumer rights, competition policy, access to knowledge and Australia’s ambitious National Innovation and Science Agenda and “ideas boom”.

Consumer group has piracy conflict of interest

63
A substantial conflict of interest issue has arisen regarding the participation by the sole consumer group invited to attend the Government's secret Internet piracy talks, with the group's chairman attending the meetings also currently leading the peak national organisation devoted to advocating copyright on behalf of creative professionals.

Hockey asks for (yet another) review of Intellectual Property policy

7
Treasurer Joe Hockey has asked the Productivity Commission to commence an inquiry into Australia’s intellectual property arrangements, in a move which will see the nation’s copyright regime reviewed yet again, following a series of similar reviews.

Defying the Senate: NBN Co refuses to disclose brand new copper needs past 1800km

76
The NBN company has flatly refused to say how much brand new copper it need beyond its existing reserves of 1800km to make its Fibre to the Node broadband rollout model function correctly, in response to a question by one of the most powerful Senators overseeing its operations.

Labor needs “a good explanation” to change NBN, says Morrow

221
The chief executive of the NBN company has made an extraordinary intervention into the pre-election national political debate over the National Broadband Network, warning Labor that it would need "a good explanation" to change the NBN model imposed by the Coalition.

Why is Anonymous hacking Australia?

7
We are in a new phase online where the blind are leading the blind, trying to find a path towards a more secure and regulated internet that enshrines our right to privacy.

NSW wants to ban smartphone, tablets, from courts

9
The New South Wales State Government has flagged plans to amend court security legislation to ban the use of devices such as smartphones and tablets to communicate events inside courtrooms to those outside, in a move that could squash see a trend towards using Twitter to report court events live.

NBN’s second satellite to launch in October

19
NBN Co has started the count down to the launch of its second telecoms satellite, which it has announced will take place on 5 October.

80 percent of Australians oppose warrantless e-surveillance

9
A new poll conducted by Essential Media has shown that 80 percent of Australians disapprove of the Government being able to access Australians' phone and Internet records without a warrant, in research which is already being hailed as "vindication" for campaigns against government intrusion into private residents' telecommunications.

ABC unlocks 3G iview iPhone app, Android coming

5
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has modified its highly popular iview streaming video iPad app so that it will function on Apple iPhones, as well as unlocking the streaming ability for the app on 3G networks and revealing that it also has a separate version in the works for Google's rival Android platform.

Time for a government rethink on Julian Assange

10
The granting of political asylum by the Ecuadorian government to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange puts pressure back on the Australian government to act, says leading QC and human rights advocate, Julian Burnside.

Secret data retention docs display gross technical ineptitude

35
A treasure trove of previously confidential documents pertaining to the Government's data retention policy and released this week under Freedom of Information laws display an astonishing technical ineptitude on the part of the Attorney-General's Department with respect to the controversial project.

Intel buys Barrie’s Sensory Networks

0
Those of you who’ve been following the exploits of Freelancer.com chief executive and all-round celebrity Australian technologist Matt Barrie will no doubt be interested in the news that one of the other companies Barrie helped found, high-performance networking outfit Sensory Networks, has been bought by giant chipmaker Intel for about $20m.

Google didn’t quite destroy Aussie Wi-Fi data

16
Search giant Google this week revealed it has not yet deleted all of the payload data its Streetview cars had collected over the past several years as they brushed past Wi-Fi networks on their journeys around Australia, contrary to a statement in May 2011 that the data had been deleted.

Turnbull, Macfarlane praise NICTA, CSIRO merger after cutting funding to “the bone”

6
Two senior Government Ministers have praised the merger and research credentials of Australia’s peak scientific and IT research organisations, despite having simultaneously cut the groups’ funding levels to a level described as “to the bone”, causing the merger and the potential loss of several hundred jobs.

Why Pirate Party members are not ‘whiny brats’

17
There appears to be an assumption within the broader intellectual property industries that members of Pirate Parties are just whiny brats who “want everything for free.” They consider us uneducated idiots who have not really given any thought into what we advocate. I find this odd.

It will take more than being ‘bouncy’ to fix Australia’s innovation system

2
It is a good sign that Turnbull is upbeat about innovation; but he appears not to understand that innovation is not a matter of pressing the right button and expecting that change will happen.

Police target Gumtree Internet pirate

5
Officers from Green Valley Local Area Command and investigators from Australian Screen Association have executed a search warrant on a residential address in Busby, NSW during which they discovered a large number of allegedly illegally stored film and television titles.

Spotify finally launches in Australia

12
news In the realisation of one of the worst-kept secrets in Australia's new media and technology sectors, Swedish music streaming Spotify has launched locally,...

Union slams job ads seeking Irish workers for NBN

15
The Communication Workers Union (CWU) has strongly criticised employment advertisements for "copper jointers & copper gurus" that aim to bring individuals from Ireland to work on the NBN rollout.

New Nationals leadership slammed copper as “redundant” in 2005

15
The new federal leadership team of the Nationals unveiled late last week -- Barnaby Joyce and Fiona Nash -- personally criticised the use of copper for broadband services in 2005, it has emerged, telling the then-Howard Government to focus on the use of Fibre to the Premises technologies instead.

Move to FTTP viable but threatened by NBN monopoly, says Budde

220
It could be economically viable for Australia to eventually shift from fibre to the node (FTTN) to fibre to the home (FTTH), but the lack of commercial competition could be an impediment, telecoms expert Paul Budde has said.

Budget 2016: Govt establishes joint taskforce to fix myGov

5
The Government has established a joint taskforce to remediate its troubled myGov digital identity and verification platform, bringing in experts from a number of government departments and throwing $50.5 million at the project.

Turnbull a ‘failure’ as Comms Minister, says Jason Clare

20
The Opposition has accused Malcolm Turnbull of being a “failure” as a Communications Minister, highlighting yesterday’s launch of Fibre to the Node technology in New South Wales as a prime example of how the “self-appointed Digital Prime Minister” is taking Australia back to “pre-war technology”.

LNP, Labor, Greens agree: Govt should support video game devs

8
Australia's three major sides of political have achieved a rare unified agreement that the Federal Government should take a wide range of measures to directly support the growth of Australia's video gaming development industry, in a move which would dovetail with Malcolm Turnbull's innovation agenda.

NBN pays Telstra $1.6bn to extend HFC cable network

60
The NBN company this morning announced it would pay Telstra about $1.6 billion over the next four years to upgrade and extend its HFC cable network as part of the National Broadband Network.

Internet Piracy rules won’t work, says Husic

6
Labor MP Ed Husic has published a lengthy article arguing new legislation and industry self-regulatory measures pushed by the Government will “do little” to resolve the issue of Internet piracy, arguing the issue is a market problem and needs to be addressed by focusing on bad corporate behaviour instead.

Unprecedented: Whole ICT sector combines to blockade TSSR bill

17
Four of Australia’s most important industry groups have joined forces to deliver an unprecedented and comprehensive rejection of the Government’s planned national security telco legislation, labelling the bill ineffective and adding burdensome regulation and costs on the private sector.

Truth: Google Fiber shows how great a FTTP NBN could be

40
Labor's original version of the NBN would have delivered the broadband capability which the global technology industry agrees will be needed for the future. It would have done so in the public interest, with the aim of delivering nation-building infrastructure, and it would have done so using a unified technology platform: The best technology platform.

Jason Clare says Turnbull ‘lied’ on copper NBN costs

35
The Opposition has accused Malcolm Turnbull of telling a "lie" with respect to the cost of upgrading Telstra's copper network to support Fibre to the Node technology on the National Broadband Network, at the time when the Prime Minister was the Shadow Communications Minister.

Snowden ‘shamefully betrayed’ USA: Bishop

28
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has heavily criticised NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden during a visit to the United States.

Palmer United Senator Wang stumps Govt with basic IT sector questions

5
Palmer United Party Senator Dio (Zhenya) Wang has taken the Government to task over its handling of Australia’s ICT research and tech startup sector, in a fraught Senate session which appeared to illustrate how little the Government’s Senate spokesperson on the issue appeared to understand about the sector’s basic dynamics.

Truth: The Govt’s data retention project has already spun out of control

12
The ridiculous number of agencies which have applied for unwarranted metadata access clearly shows that the data retention policy enacted by the Coalition and Labor was founded on a preposterous lie: That access would be limited. The truth is that scope creep was built into the policy's DNA.

EFA ‘concerned’ about Nikolic Security appointment, Senate encryption motion

3
Electric Frontiers Australia (EFA) has said it is "concerned" about the recent appointment of Tasmanian MP Andrew Nikolic as Chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.

Attorney-General briefed on PRISM months before Snowden leaks

3
Documents obtained by the ABC under Freedom of Information laws have shown that then-Labor Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus received a secret briefing on the US National Security Agency's controversial PRISM surveillance program several months before the program was outed by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Analysis by ex-NBN CTO shows NBN activation rate is actually slowing

276
Analysis by the NBN company's first chief technology officer Gary McLaren appears to have shown that the activation rate of new NBN broadband connections is actually slowing, in a move that McLaren has speculated may be due to political reasons in an election year or merely the difficulty of dealing with copper and HFC technologies.

Turnbull’s NBN “hardly on target”, says Labor

130
The Australian Labor Party has criticised a Government statement saying NBN Co has "exceeded" its targets for the financial year 2016, suggesting that the national broadband network is actually "hardly on target".

Australian Govt pledges action on Google tax avoidance

54
The Australian Government has outlined a series of new legislative initiatives with which it will attempt to protect its corporate tax base and rein in the tax minimisation strategies of corporations such as search giant Google, which expects to pay just $74,000 in corporate income tax for the 2011 calendar year in Australia, despite making an estimated $1 billion in local revenue.

ThoughtWorks slams ABS for census data retention “risk”

22
Global software consultancy ThoughtWorks has strongly criticised the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) for "risk" it took in the running of the Australian Census 2016, which saw the body retain the details of millions of people.

The iPhone 15 is (almost) unimaginable

11
With half the worlds population now connected by mobile phone and even short periods of time disconnected from the global network leaving many with withdrawal symptoms, the next stage of human evolution is approaching fast and if you're having trouble keeping up, look to nature.

“Great news”: Fifield launches FTTN near Ballarat

67
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has announced the launch of Fibre to the Node services this week in regional Victoria, describing the move as "great news" for local residents.

Turnbull blames IBM, ABS for Census website failure

18
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has put some the blame for the failure of the Census website on the shoulders of IBM, saying the measures the firm put in place for the functioning of the site were "inadequate". However, the ABS also came in for some flak.