Government > More stories
ASIO seeks new hires for telecoms interception teams
Australia's security intelligence organisation (ASIO) is hiring a clutch of telecoms intelligence staff.
The agency is after a new “Assistant Director Telecommunications Interception” , a pair of ”Telecommunications Investigations Officers (we've linked to the better-paid of the two positions) and also a “Telecommunications …
Corruption cops warn on old-school project management
The New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) has cast its eye over the IT sector, and suspects that there's a gap between project management practise and the real world that opens the door to corruption.
The issue the ICAC is trying to address is the way that a shift from staff to contractors can open the …
Oh noes! New 'CRISIS DISASTER' at Fukushima! Oh wait, it's nothing. Again
The world's media is working itself into an unedifying state of hysteria (again) following the news that radioactive water has leaked from a holding tank at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, damaged two years back by a tsunami and earthquake which led to the death and injury of more than 20,000 people - though not a single one …
Assange's WikiLeaks Party running-mate departs in blaze of glory
Arguments over how the Australian political party founded by Julian AssangeTM, the WikiLeaks Party, directs votes in the Australian Senate have prompted the resignation of high-profile candidate and Assange's running mate in Victoria, Leslie Cannold, who announced today: "To keep being a candidate feels like I'm breaking faith …
Vietnamese city drinks the smart city kool aid
The Vietnamese city of Danang today took a major step towards becoming the smartest and most technologically advanced city in the nation, with the launch of a comprehensive Information Technology and Communication Infrastructure System.
The system includes a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN), city-wide Wi-Fi access capable of …
West Australia guarantees SKA funding to 2019
Australia's International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research has had its future secured through to 2019, courtesy of a $AU26 million commitment from the Western Australian government announced at the end of last week.
The ICRAR was instrumental in attracting part of the international Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project to …
Green German gov battles to keep fossil powerplants running
The German government is engaged in increasingly heated negotiations with energy companies in an effort to stop them closing carbon-emitting power plants which have been rendered unprofitable by the national renewables policies.
Last week power giant RWE grumbled that many of its coal and gas power stations "are no longer …
Assange washes hands in election row
Julian Assange has weighed out of the row in Australia over the Wikileaks Party's preference allocation for the upcoming election.
In an interview with Perth radio station RTR-FM, the embassy-dwelling one said decisions about preference distribution (in which the party choose where preference votes go, in what's known as above- …
Snowden's email provider may face court rap after closing service
The owner of an encrypted email service used by NSA leaker Edward Snowden could be facing contempt of court charges after refusing to hand over his users' information to spooks, according to a recent report.
Ladar Levison dramatically shut down his email firm, Lavabit, after being whacked with a secret federal court order. …
Does the RSPCA have your gun licence or car registration? NOBODY knows
No checks are carried out on what the Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) does with confidential records it receives from police databases, including information on people's vehicles and gun licences, the Register has learned.
Precise details of the Information Sharing Agreements (ISAs) between the RSCPA …
Wikileaks Party scrambles to explain election decisions
The Wikileaks Party, established to give Julian AssangeTM a seat in Australia's Senate, has found itself scrambling to explain why it seems to endorse far-right-wing parties ahead of the Australian political mainstream in New South Wales, and is punishing The Greens in Western Australia.
The row emerged after the Australian …
Election 2013: What does it mean for Australian IT pros?
Podcast Australia goes to the polls on September 7th, when the nation will elect a new government.
At the time of writing the right-of-centre opposition Liberal/National coalition is favoured to form government, replacing the incumbent Labor party.
The two groups differ in important ways for the technology industries.
The most …
NSA coughs to 1000s of unlawful acts of snooping on US soil since 2008
The NSA violated privacy laws thousands of times in the last five years by spying on US citizens, an internal audit by the super-snoopers has disclosed.
The Washington Post reports that the intelligence agency also overstepped its legal remit since Congress gave it broad powers in 2008.
Most of the violations involved …
China mulls probe into IBM, Oracle, EMC after NSA hack claims - report
China is reportedly preparing to look into NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden's claims that US spooks hacked into IBM, Oracle and EMC products sold to the Asian nation's universities.
The three American corporations could face a probe by Chinese police and government officials on the subject of “security issues”. The investigation …
AREA 51 - THE TRUTH by the CIA: Official dossier blows lid off US secrets
Pic A declassified CIA report made public this week includes copious references to the United States' mysterious Area 51 base.
The Cold War-era dossier on the U-2 spy plane was published by the George Washington University's National Security Archive - and acknowledges the existence of the highly hush-hush patch of Nevada desert, a …
Bureaucrats foil Nestlé's bid to TRADEMARK KitKat's chocolatey digits
Analysis British bureaucrats' refusal to protect the KitKat chocolate bar's distinctive four-finger design from copycats has been slammed by UK lawyers as "remarkable" - and they say the decision has ominous implications for businesses fighting off competitors.
The UK Intellectual Property Office - an agency of the government's …
Brits: We can STOP TROLLS if we know where they LIVE - poll
The Great British Public want an end to anonymous registration for social media accounts in the aftermath of high-profile online abuse cases, pollsters have claimed – and the older and more conservative they are, the more likely they are to want it.
A YouGov survey found that 72 per cent of the British public want social media …
Telefonica and Arqiva set to mop up BILLIONS in smart meter cash
Companies who win upcoming government contracts to install smart utility meters across the UK are set to pocket over £2bn in public money.
The money will come from the Department of Energy and Climate Change and will be spent over the next 15 years, at which point the UK is expected to have 20 million smart meters in operation. …
Bitcoin laws are coming: US Senate launches virty currency probe
The heat is on for Bitcoin and other virtual currencies in the US, with lawmakers at the highest levels of government now actively investigating how to regulate the upstart digital monies.
On Tuesday, the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs sent letters to a number of prominent federal regulatory …
Obama appoints intelligence boss to run 'independent' review of NSA
President Obama has appointed James Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence who was recently caught misleading Congress about the extent of NSA surveillance, as the head of the Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies that will investigate the agency.
The president announced the review of US …
Norway BANS Apple from Oslo's skies: No aerial Maps app snaps allowed
Apple has been denied permission to take aerial photographs of Oslo to create 3D images of the Norwegian capital for its Maps app – even though the US embassy has appealed to the Scandinavian nation's government to reconsider.
The fruity firm has been stymied by the Norwegian government, local media is reporting, because of …
New York State to investigate 'Wild West' Bitcoin industry
A New York State banking regulator has issued subpoenas to more than 20 Bitcoin-related companies as part of an inquiry into the business practices of the virtual currency industry, The Wall Street Journal reports.
"If virtual currencies remain a virtual Wild West for narcotraffickers and other criminals, that would not only …
Australian government websites in "compulsory mod" mode during election campaign
Australian federal government websites – everything in the gov.au domain that's managed at the federal level – are frantically putting moderators onto anything that resembles online engagement.
From the time that the Prime Minister visited the Governor-General in Yarralumla to request that she dissolve the parliament, “caretaker …
Gov: Half of new tech spending must be made with SME suppliers
The UK government is trying to accelerate procurement reforms and hit ambitious targets by directing at least half of all new IT spending to small biz suppliers before the next general election.
One of the grand aims of the Cabinet Office had been to route 25 per cent of all government IT business through SMEs by the end of …
Notorious Mexican drug kingpin nabbed thanks to drones and spyware
An alleged leader of Mexico's infamous Los Zetas gang was captured last month using a combination of commercial computer spyware, GPS mobile tracking and aerial drones, according to Mexican reports.
Miguel Treviño Morales – also known as “Z-40” – was captured by the North American country's marines on 15 July.
The US Drug …
NSA to world+dog: We're only watching 1.6% of internet, honest
The US's National Security Agency (NSA) has issued a document titled The National Security Agency: Missions, Authorities, Oversight and Partnerships (PDF) that explains some of its operations - and includes a claim it “... touches about 1.6 per cent... “ of daily internet traffic and “...only 0.025 per cent is actually selected …
Obama proposes four-point plan to investigate US data spooks
In a Friday press conference, President Obama laid out a plan to review the USA PATRIOT Act, secret intelligence courts, and activities of the NSA.
The revelations of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden had nothing to do with the review, Obama insisted, saying that as a senator he had supported more transparency and had spoken of …
Juniper under bribery investigation by US regulators
Packet-pusher Juniper Networks is under investigation by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission, it has emerged.
The regulators are pursuing the company over "possible violations" of the anti-bribery US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the company revealed in its 10-Q filing with the SEC on Thursday …
2 in 5 top Brit biz bosses expect IT dept to drive 'technical innovation'
China and the US are investing more in technology in a bid to drive innovation than the UK, more than half of respondents to a new survey have said.
According to management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company Accenture which conducted the poll - and published the results this week - 56 per cent of business …
NSA gets burned by a sysadmin, decides to burn 90% of its sysadmins
The NSA has announced its brainwave to end further leaks about its secret operations by disaffected employees: it will simply sack 90 per cent of all its sysadmins.
The US surveillance agency's spyboss General Keith Alexander told a computer security conference in New York that automating much of his organisation's work - such …
Watchdog drags Home Office to naughty step for dragging feet on FOIs
The Home Office may face sanctions if it fails again to reply to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests on time, the Information Commissioner warned today.
The department - run by Home Secretary Theresa May - will be monitored by the watchdog to see how fast it responds to FOIs received between 1 July and 30 September this year …
Jimbo: Software used for network-level smut-blocking DOESN'T WORK
Quotw This was the week when IBM was banned by the Australian state of Queensland, which may well fire folks for hiring Big Blue if they're doing so for government projects.
It turns out that the tech stalwart behaved "unethically" when trying to win the bid to develop a new application for the state's Department of Health, according …
Serious Farce Office: 32K secret BAE probe files spaffed to WRONG bod
The UK's top anti-fraud agency has admitted it sent tens of thousands of sensitive documents from an investigation into arms giant BAE Systems to the wrong person.
The probe into multinational defence corporation BAE Systems ended after the aerospace firm paid a whopping $400m fine to the US relating to a violation of US rules …
US taxmen told to hush up shadowy drug squad unit laundering NSA intel
A manual for America's taxmen detailing US drug squads' access to NSA intelligence has emerged - and revealed that the controversial supply of information has been an open secret in government for years.
Reuters reports that the handbook, which was issued to IRS tax collectors between 2005 and 2006, instructs officials to omit …
Ofcom: Making a switch between ISPs will soon be much easier
Ofcom is bringing in new measures to finally make it much easier for broadband and landline customers in the UK to drop one telco in favour of another provider.
In the past, subscribers were required to do loads of legwork to make the switch, which often meant they were much more reluctant to ditch their existing ISP – even if …
Cameron demands Brits BOYCOTT angry-troll-infested websites
Prime Minister David Cameron has told Brits to "boycott" websites that allow trolls and bullies to publish reams of nasty abuse and threats with wild abandon.
His comments came after the father of 14-year-old Hannah Smith claimed his daughter, who had been bullied on Lativan-based ask.fm, had killed herself to escape the online …
Obama cancels meeting Putin in Russia, says Snowden 'a factor'
President Obama has cancelled a planned pow-wow with Russian president Vladimir Putin at next month's G20 Summit in St Petersburg, saying the granting of asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was "a factor."
"Following a careful review begun in July, we have reached the conclusion that there is not enough recent progress in …
Suspected brains behind bank-account-draining Gozi extradited to US
Latvia will extradite an alleged pusher of the online bank account raiding Trojan Gozi to the US - despite opposition from the Baltic republic's foreign minister.
Deniss Calovskis, 27, and two other alleged co-conspirators (Russian national Nikita Kuzmin and Mihai Ionut Paunescu, a 28-year-old Romanian) were accused of …
Tax dodging? It's harder to do - and rarer - than you think
Video So you'd like to know how to avoid tax. After all, everyone else seems to be doing it, so why end up as the Muggins who has to pay while everyone else mugs the Treasury?
The simplest and most obvious method of not paying taxes is simply to avoid doing anything. If you're not taking part in economic activity then no one will be …
Queensland bans IBM from future work
The Australian State of Queensland has barred IBM from future government work, “until it improves its governance and contracting practices.”
Queensland is grumpy with IBM because of its role in a billion-dollar blowout of a payroll system for its health department.
An inquiry into IBM's role in the project yesterday concluded …
NBN builder Syntheo gives up in two States
Syntheo, the joint venture between Lend Lease and Service Stream Limited that won contracts to build Australia's National Broadband Network (NBN) in the States of West Australia and South Australia, will down tools forever in those States early in 2014.
NBN Co's canned utterance on the matter says it and Syntheo “ have mutually …
IBM committed 'ethical transgressions' to win botched project
IBM has found to have acted unethically during a bid to win work developing a new payroll application for the Australian state of Queensland's Department of Health, but has not been held directly or solely responsible for the $AUD1bn blowout in costs on the project.
IBM's been under the microscope for its role in this project …
