Sweden may be about to adopt increased surveillance of the internet, with new proposals about data retention and network rules leaked to local ISP Bahnhof. The proposals are contained in submissions to a parliamentary inquiry into Sweden's data retention regime, which came into force in 2010. The company says it's been passed …

The Australian Government's telecommunications data retention scheme is racking up the bills for carriers, but government funding has fallen short of the industry's costs. That's one of the conclusions of the first [PDF] telecommunications interception report since the scheme began, tabled in Federal Parliament yesterday. …

Australia's telecoms industry advocacy body the Communications Alliance is renewing its push for the federal government to revise its data retention regime, amid fears that a review will see stored data sucked into civil lawsuits. The take-out-the-trash timing of the review, announced in the afternoon of Friday December 23, …

Canada's Federal Court has rapped the Canadian Security Intelligence Service's (CSIS) knuckles for retaining too much citizen metadata. Its judgement (in a secret case, with relevant names redacted) was handed down in October and published last Thursday. Justice Simon Noel was more than peeved that the CSIS gathered data …

Australians who don't know what the nation spends on defence also don't mind the country's data retention regime. That's according to an Australian National University (ANU) survey that's mostly been written up from the press release but which The Reg has considered a little more deeply. The full report, here, lists out the …

Reg Coutts, long-time telecommunications consultant and academic, has dropped a bucket on what he sees as a big danger in Australia's data retention regime. Writing in Canberra insider magazine The Mandarin, Coutts says it's clear that the lawyers and natsec types that decided what should be collected have a misplaced faith in …

South Australia's police commissioner has said he fields 100 complaints a year regarding inappropriate data access by police officers. Commissioner Grant Stevens was speaking to the state parliament's budget and finance committee on Monday. Abuse of data access has become a hot topic in South Australia in the wake of a murder …

Governments around the world are legislating to collect metadata, usually with the excuse that modern crime-fighting and national security efforts require access to records of citizens' communications. In many nations that's sparked what I call "horizontal" scope-creep, in which, as just one example, the Australian Health …

Australia's Department of Industry, Innovation and Science is taking applications from the telco and ISP sectors for grants to help them cope with data retention. The AU$128 million was promised during 2015, amid a fierce debate over the data retention scheme, with the industry saying the amount falls far short of their likely …

A Sydney magistrate has called “criminal” a vindictive operation in which NSW police snooped on someone's private Facebook posts. Exactly why a senior constable called Daniel Moss decided to get himself an invitation under a fake identity to see the private posts of “Rhys Brown” (in real name Rhys Halvey) isn't given in this …

The metadata retention scheme dreamed up by Australia's federal government may be stalled and in a shambles, but the Inspector General of Intelligence and Security isn't waiting for things to go wrong: it's recruiting specialists to watch over the scheme. Turned up by Crikey (which Tweeted it as a search for “contractors”, …

In the Australian State of Victoria, the first Tuesday in November is a public holiday to celebrate The Melbourne Cup*, a horse race known as "the race-that stops a nation." And on yesterday's holiday, the latest piece of scope-creep wish-listing over Australia's data retention regime should emerged and concerned the horse- …

Australia's telecommunications companies disclosed information to Australian authorities 600,019 times in 2014/15, according to the annual reports of the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). The new report (PDF) lists “Disclosures made under Part 13 of the Telecommunications Act 1997— by carriers and carriage …

With the kind-of-launch of the Australian government's telecommunications data retention regime, there's been a plethora of advice everywhere – from “lad mags” to the tech press to political parties – with one theme: “get a virtual private network” (VPN). Which moves Vulture South to idly wonder: do people know that a VPN on …

Today, October 13th, is the day on which Australian telecommunications service providers are required to start retaining customer metadata in an orderly fashion determined by law, but fewer than ten are ready to do so and some have asked the government if they can store the data without encryption. The legislation, co- …

Australia's Attorney-General's Department hasn't worked out when money to support telcos' and ISPs' data retention efforts will start to flow. The department, left in the hands of Grand Sysadmin George Brandis in Malcolm Turnbull's cabinet reshuffle, has been criticised by the Communications Alliance for being vague about the …

One of the individuals who first brought the Internet to Australia, Geoff Huston, has unloaded on the federal government's chaotic attempt to introduce its data retention regime. Now chief scientist at APNIC, Huston has written in his Potaroo blog that one of the key assumptions behind the data retention regime, a stable …

Telcos will be required to retain data on spam, failed email, and borked voice over IP phone calls under the Australian Federal Government's looming data retention plan. Data retention comes into effect 15 October. It requires telecommunications providers retain metadata information on subscribers but not the content of …