Access to private net, phone use up by 20% - without warrants - Sydney Morning Herald

Data access is " out of control" ... Scott Ludlam.

AUSTRALIAN law enforcement and government agencies have sharply increased their access without warrant to vast quantities of private telephone and internet data, prompting calls for tighter controls on surveillance powers.

The federal Attorney-General's Department has released official figures showing government agencies accessed private telecommunications data and internet logs more than 300,000 times during criminal and revenue investigations in 2011-12, a 20 per cent increase on the level of surveillance activity in the previous year.

Law enforcement and other government agencies obtained private data from telecommunications and internet service providers 5800 times every week, on average.

The biggest users of telecommunications data were NSW police with 103,824 access authorisations in 2011-12. Victorian police accessed data 67,173 times in the same period, while the Australian Federal Police did so 23,001 times.

Victoria Police have said a 33 per cent rise in use of telecommunications data over two years could be attributed to ''investigator knowledge becom[ing] more widely known, technology changes and auto processing [that has] simplified the process''.

Federal government agencies using telecommunications data include the Australian Crime Commission, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, Australian Tax Office, the Departments of Defence, Foreign Affairs and Trade, Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Immigration and Citizenship, Health and Ageing, Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs; as well as Medicare, Centrelink, and Australia Post.

Statistics for access by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation are security classified and not published.

Telecommunications data is also used by all state police and anti-corruption bodies and a growing number of state government departments, revenue offices and regulatory agencies. Data is also accessed by the RSPCA in Victoria, Queensland and Tasmania, and by local governments including Bankstown City Council in Sydney and Wyndham City Council in Melbourne's west.

The data available to government agencies under federal telecommunications law includes phone and internet account information, outward and inward call details, phone and internet access location data, and details of internet protocol addresses visited, though not the actual content of communications. Data access is authorised by senior police officers or officials, rather than by a judicial warrant.

Although federal government proposals for a further expansion of law enforcement access to telecommunications data, including a minimum two-year data retention standard for phone and internet providers, has generated public debate and controversy, the Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, did not issue any statement to accompany the release of the latest statistics which were tabled in Parliament without debate on Thursday.

The Australian Greens senator Scott Ludlam said the increase in access authorisations demonstrated the data access regime was ''out of control''. ''There can't be much in the way of working checks and balances if we have a 20 per cent surge in activity in one year, and more than 300,000 authorisations. This is the personal data of hundreds of thousands, indeed millions of Australians, and it seems that just about anyone in government can get it.''

A spokesperson for Ms Roxon said Parliament's Intelligence Committee is reviewing telephone interception and surveillance powers to ensure access for police but also the ''right checks and balances to ensure that those who enforce our national security laws do so responsibly''.