Journalists in jail? Australia weighs implications of police raids on media

arrestpaul

Could you be more specific about the ' allowed the AFP to "add, copy, delete or alter" material found ' part? Does the ' add, copy, delete or alter ' pertain to evidence that would be admissible in court, or does that pertain only to information as it would be released to the public?

The warrant allowed the AFP to “add, copy, delete or alter” material in the ABC’s (federal broadcaster) computers. It did not specify as to what "material" would be used for, and did state that the scope was specified to a range of topics - but that scope was EXTREMELY broad. For further info, check out The Age (newspaper) Wed June 5.

Either scenario you suggest, is a scary suggestion.

half-hearted jumper - And Gaughan did not address the extremely broad nature of the warrant, that allowed the AFP to "add, copy, delete or alter" material found. Is that not scary? Whilst the first three verbs are scary, the fourth is horrifying. The right to alter material found.

Could you be more specific about the ' allowed the AFP to "add, copy, delete or alter" material found ' part? Does the ' add, copy, delete or alter ' pertain to evidence that would be admissible in court, or does that pertain only to information as it would be released to the public?

redelmotalking: "At this rate the country will soon be renamed the People's Republic of Australia!"

Too late we are already the 51 State of the US. How many US warships steam into Sydney Harbour? How many bases does the US have in Australia? We are already under US dictatorship; we vote for an Australian Prime Minister and get a Washington master. How many wars have we fought to advance the dictatorship of our US masters?

arrestpaul

According to acting AFP Commissioner Neil Gaughan -

"No section of the community should be immune to this kind of activity or evidence collection more broadly," Gaughan told reporters in Canberra.

And Gaughan did not address the extremely broad nature of the warrant, that allowed the AFP to "add, copy, delete or alter" material found. Is that not scary? Whilst the first three verbs are scary, the fourth is horrifying. The right to alter material found.

Additionally, after not finding what they expected (but finding questionable material - but outside the scope of the warrant), the parameters of search within the warrant were changed retroactively.

Headline -

Journalists in jail? Australia weighs implications of police raids on media

According to the story -

Australia has no underlying safeguards for free speech in its constitution. When the government ratcheted up counter-espionage laws in 2018, it added a provision to protect whistleblowers.

According to acting AFP Commissioner Neil Gaughan -

"No section of the community should be immune to this kind of activity or evidence collection more broadly," Gaughan told reporters in Canberra.

"I'm not going to rule in or rule out anyone being subject to further charges. We haven't made a decision, one way or the other," he said when asked if journalists could be charged as part of the investigation.

So the big questions seems to be - How did these media outlets obtain classified government information? Were they given stolen information? Did they steal the information?

Another question is whether Australia should create it's own version of the U.S. 1st Amendment.

3 Chinese warships steamed into Sydney Harbour on Monday, taking many Australians by surprise. Few were aware they were coming. On Tuesday and Wednesday, Australian journalists were raided by federal police and are now threatened with jail for receiving “state secrets”. A few years ago the Port of Darwin was readily leased to China for 99 years. At this rate the country will soon be renamed the People's Republic of Australia!

I’d like to know what Mr. Trump thinks about this. I’ll bet he thinks it’s just grand.

Open your eyes. It has little to nothing to do with Trump, or whoever else is in the White House (unless by some miracle Tulsi Gabbard is elected).

I’d like to know what Mr. Trump thinks about this. I’ll bet he thinks it’s just grand.

This B.S. will end someday people. For the sake of our children, pray it’s sooner than later and easier than harder.

Power to the People

Then they came for you and me.

First they came for Julian Assange....

This is nothing more that the Liberal Party and Dudhead Dutton wanting to hide government crimes and rorting. The Liberal Party refuse to setup an open ICAC to stop the voters knowing how they rort and misuse taxpayers funds, they refuse to allow journalists access to offshore refugee detention centres so the pubic does not know the conditions of the refugees/centres and now they refuse to allow publications of their war crimes. The is the same as the US is doing against Julian Assage, so one has to ask if these raids are being done under Washington orders to justify the treatment of Assage.

The Australian public is being treated like fools by this government and unless the public now push back we will be a Fascist State. We need to take control of our freedom and democracy as we are losing it daily. In fact, with the amount of secrecy of this government, we not even know how much freedom we have already lost.

Australia moving closer to China?-Well, in the way 'things' are done, you know, the freedom, human rights, democracy things. Could think of some more principles. Probably you too.

jcapan

Nagging implications like are we really a functioning democracy? What have our politicians been saying about Chinese censorship all these years? Oh wait...

It bothers me immensely. Yet Australia's oft been one to criticize - look at our (yes, I'm Australian) human rights issues with the off-shore "detention centers" in Nauru and Manus... yet we've been quick to castigate other countries (again, China) for their misdeeds.

Nagging implications like are we really a functioning democracy? What have our politicians been saying about Chinese censorship all these years? Oh wait...