New coordinator for cybersecurity to lead national agency

Josh Butler

Josh Butler

The government will set up a new cybersecurity office inside the Department of Home Affairs and investigate whether to ban the payment of ransoms to hackers, in the wake of major online attacks affecting millions of Australians.

Prime minister Anthony Albanese and home affairs minister Clare O’Neil will announce later today that it will establish a coordinator for cybersecurity, leading a National Office for Cyber Security, inside the Department of Home Affairs. It will lead a central response from the government to major cyber incidents.

The government claims it has inherited “a cyber mess” from the former Coalition government. The new position will lead coordination and action on hacks like the Optus breach.

The announcement will come in a cybersecurity roundtable that the PM will lead in Sydney today. Areas of discussion for that meeting will include whether the government should prohibit the payment of ransoms or extortion demands by cyber criminals, in a bid to deter such attacks – the logic being, that if Australians are legally banned from paying ransoms, criminals will have less chance of getting ransoms.

The meeting will also discuss what impact such a ransom ban would have, as well as talk about boosting cyber skills and workforce through education or immigration changes.

O’Neil:

The case for change is clear.

Australia has a patchwork of policies, laws and frameworks that are not keeping up with the challenges presented by the digital age. Voluntary measures and poorly executed plans will not get Australia where we need to be to thrive in the contested environment of 2030.

To achieve our vision of being the world’s most cyber secure country by 2030, we need the unified effort of government, industry and the community.

The expert advisory board’s leader, Andy Penn, said Australia’s national security and economic success “rely on us getting our cyber settings right”:

If we are to lift and sustain cyber resilience and security, it must be an integrated whole-of-nation endeavour. We need a coordinated and concerted effort by governments, individuals, and businesses of all sizes.

Key events

Josh Butler

Josh Butler

‘No intention’ of making super changes, PM says

Anthony Albanese says his government has “no intention of making changes in superannuation” but says it wants to have a debate about its purpose – not exactly shutting down expectations that those with the biggest super balances could see their lucrative tax breaks trimmed down.

The PM appeared on The Project last night, where he got a few questions on the potential super changes that others in the government have been discussing. On the table at this stage is the potential for tax concessions for super voluntary contributions (taxed at 15%, much lower than income tax) to be shaved down for people with balances over $3m – which is less than 1% of the country.

Channel 10 showed the PM a clip of an interview during last year’s election when Albanese said the government had no intention of making changes to super.

Albanese responded:

I said, we had no intention. That’s not the objective here. But people are coming forward with ideas. We’re not shutting down debate.

It is appropriate there be debate about the policy future across a range of issues, particularly in the context of the trillion dollars in debt we inherited. But we have no intention of making changes in superannuation.

We will have the debate about the purpose and the definition of what it is and try to enshrine that in legislation, so people get what the purpose is much more clearer.

Albanese went on to say that the government “had no changes”. Of course, this is a common type of phrasing from governments considering changes, to say they have made no changes (with a “yet” often the unsaid but mutually understood part of that line):

We’ve had no changes. We’re not here announcing changes. We are having a discussion about the purpose of superannuation. This is all hypothetical. So if we make an announcement, then you can scrutinise what that announcement is, but we’ve made it very clear that no decisions have been made.

Australia’s T20 World Cup glory against South Africa

In sporting news, Australia has taken out the T20 World Cup for the third time in a row, enjoying a 19-run victory over host nation South Africa.

Player of the match Beth Mooney scored an unbeaten 74 from just 53 deliveries helping to guide Australia for six for 156.

You can read the full report from Raf Nicholson at Newlands:

Landmark class action launching for former AFL players with concussion injuries

For the first time in Australia, a class action by former footballers is being launched agains the AFL for the effects of concussion injuries.

It’s an issue my colleague Stephanie Convery has been covering with powerful stories about what individuals like Terry Strong and their families have gone through.

The Melbourne firm Margalit Injury Lawyers is bringing the action in the supreme court, and managing principal Michel Margalit has spoken to ABC News about the issue:

We have been consulting with many, many former AFL players and AFLW players. It’s astounding how many people have suffered from life-altering concussion-type injuries. At this time we have been building a case and we have intention in lodging a class action this week in relation to their loss of earnings and pain and suffering.

At this stage, what we have been looking at is a public liability-type of claim which is separate to any of the compensation funds that currently exist. There are a number of piecemeal fund-related compensation schemes and what we’re concerned about is that these funds do not properly compensate the players and the compensation available is much, much less and there aren’t appropriate measures for redress if people are not happy.

There’s been a huge groundswell over the previous years. There’s been class actions in America and in the UK. The class action in America garnered a settlement of almost a billion dollars, but there’s also been more science emerging and it’s not around the impact of concussion as such, but because that’s been well-established since 1995, but we’re now able to prove that these players who have ongoing symptoms that it’s actually connected to their playing of football.

Margalit says compensation is expected “to be in the same vicinity as the NFL class action, so many hundreds of millions of dollars”.

Scamps on Liverpool plains

Independent MP Sophie Scamps visited the Liverpool plains last week for a conference of farmers and traditional owners fighting Santos coal seam project and the accompanying Hunter gas pipeline.

While the inland plains are a long way from Scamps’ northern beaches seat of Mackellar, she said she was concerned about the project because her constituents’ top concern remains climate action. Scamps told ABC News this morning:

Strong action on climate change has been the No 1 issue for the people of Mackellar before and during the election. We just conducted a survey and strong action on climate change is one of the things top of mind for the people there. … We know that oil and gas can’t go ahead anywhere. And that is what is proposed on the Liverpool plains.

On the concerns from locals in the Liverpool plains, Scamps says:

They are concerned about the impact on climate change, because methane is one of the most potent greenhouse gases – 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide. They’re also very concerned and we had people in tears, very concerned about the impact on food product ion on the farmland.

The Liverpool plains, it is one of the most fertile pieces of land, matched only with the Ukraine, is the alluvial soil which is up to 10 metres deep there. It is Australia’s food bowl and also the rest of the world’s food bowl. So farmers are concerned about how this will impact their farming. They are concerned and any change to the levels of the land will make a huge impact. The subsidence that can happen with coal-seam gas mining would be a big problem for them.

And then the other major is – how it will impact the water supply and the aquifers below the land. Because with coal-seam gas, you need to take out the water first. It needs to be expelled and evaporated and that will impact the aquifers below the land and we know that those aquifers in the Liverpool plains feed the Murray-Darling Basin. There’s huge impacts down the line. So food security, water security, climate change and just destruction of the environment.

Our rural editor Gabrielle Chan and photographer-at-large Mike Bowers were at the same conference. You can read more here:

Mostafa Rachwani

Mostafa Rachwani

Thousands pay tribute to Olivia Newton-John at Australian memorial service

A host of international stars and dignitaries paid tribute to Australian star Olivia Newton-John in at a state memorial service in Melbourne yesterday.

Thousands gathered at Hamer Hall and video tributes came from Elton John, Hugh Jackman, Dolly Parton, Pink, Barry Gibb and Mariah Carey.

See also  9th Circuit Court reverses ruling that struck down deportation law as racist

Singer Delta Goodrem hugs a fan outside a state memorial service for Olivia Newton-John at Hamer Hall in Melbourne yesterday
Singer Delta Goodrem hugs a fan outside a state memorial service for Olivia Newton-John at Hamer Hall in Melbourne yesterday. Photograph: James Ross/EPA

Newton-John, who has a string of No 1 hits worldwide and starred in movies such as Grease and Xanadu, died in August aged 73.

Members of Newton-John’s family also gave touching tributes, with her husband John Easterling saying she was a “healer”.

You have to understand, I wasn’t an Olivia fan, I didn’t know any Olivia music, I’d never even seen Grease.

But at this small theatre in Miami, she started singing Pearls on a Chain, and there was this healing moving through the audience. And it hit me like a laser beam in the chest, that Olivia was a healer, and this was one of her mediums of healing.

IT outage at Gold Coast airport

In more airport news, an IT outage at the Gold Coast airport has left passengers unable to check in for flights.

Tudge advisers to front robodebt inquiry

Top advisers to former human services minister Alan Tudge will appear at the royal commission into the unlawful robodebt scheme, AAP reports.

The chief of staff and a former policy adviser to Tudge will front the inquiry in Brisbane at the fourth block of hearings into the automated debt assessment and recovery program.

The robodebt scheme continued to operate for several years despite concerns it was unlawful, with some people taking their own lives while being pursued for debt.

Tudge has already appeared before the inquiry, where he said his understanding of income averaging was that it had been used for decades and it did not occur to him it may have been unlawful:

My mind was not acting as a lawyer. It was acting as an implementer of the policy.

Tudge has since announced his resignation from federal politics, triggering a byelection in his outer-eastern Melbourne seat of Aston.

Three other former social service ministers are also set to front the hearing this week.

Stuart Robert and Michael Keenan will front hearings for the first time while Marise Payne will reappear after previously giving evidence in December.

Annette Musolino, former chief counsel at the Department of Human Services, will also appear for the second time.

The royal commission is set to hand down its report on 30 June after the deadline was extended when an extra 100,000 documents were produced.

Jetstar travellers stranded on Alice Springs tarmac land in Melbourne

Hundreds of Jetstar travellers spent almost seven hours on the tarmac at Alice Springs airport yesterday.

Their flight from Bangkok to Melbourne was diverted to Alice Springs after a passenger experienced a suspected stroke and required urgent medical assistance.

Upon arrival into Alice Springs the passenger was taken to hospital by ambulance.

While the aircraft was on the ground in Alice Springs, an electrical issue was detected, which required a replacement part to be sourced from Sydney.

Jetstar explained that the 320 passengers had been stuck on board because the airport lacked customs facilities:

As a domestic airport, Alice Springs does not have customs processing facilities and we worked with Border Agencies, the NT Police and the local Airport Authority to provide passengers with the option to disembark into a specially partitioned section of the Airport.

They were then transferred directly onto the replacement aircraft. We worked with the local Airport to provide passengers with food, drinks and snacks.

We appreciate this has been a lengthy delay and frustrating experience. Safety is always our first priority, and we thank passengers for their patience and understanding as we supported the passenger requiring urgent medical assistance and worked to get everyone else on their way as quickly as possible.

The passengers from Thailand have arrived in Melbourne after a second aircraft flew them from Alice Springs yesterday afternoon.

New coordinator for cybersecurity to lead national agency

Josh Butler

Josh Butler

The government will set up a new cybersecurity office inside the Department of Home Affairs and investigate whether to ban the payment of ransoms to hackers, in the wake of major online attacks affecting millions of Australians.

Prime minister Anthony Albanese and home affairs minister Clare O’Neil will announce later today that it will establish a coordinator for cybersecurity, leading a National Office for Cyber Security, inside the Department of Home Affairs. It will lead a central response from the government to major cyber incidents.

The government claims it has inherited “a cyber mess” from the former Coalition government. The new position will lead coordination and action on hacks like the Optus breach.

The announcement will come in a cybersecurity roundtable that the PM will lead in Sydney today. Areas of discussion for that meeting will include whether the government should prohibit the payment of ransoms or extortion demands by cyber criminals, in a bid to deter such attacks – the logic being, that if Australians are legally banned from paying ransoms, criminals will have less chance of getting ransoms.

The meeting will also discuss what impact such a ransom ban would have, as well as talk about boosting cyber skills and workforce through education or immigration changes.

O’Neil:

The case for change is clear.

Australia has a patchwork of policies, laws and frameworks that are not keeping up with the challenges presented by the digital age. Voluntary measures and poorly executed plans will not get Australia where we need to be to thrive in the contested environment of 2030.

To achieve our vision of being the world’s most cyber secure country by 2030, we need the unified effort of government, industry and the community.

The expert advisory board’s leader, Andy Penn, said Australia’s national security and economic success “rely on us getting our cyber settings right”:

If we are to lift and sustain cyber resilience and security, it must be an integrated whole-of-nation endeavour. We need a coordinated and concerted effort by governments, individuals, and businesses of all sizes.

Cyber attacks occurred last year withno cyber emergency response function’, O’Neil says

A new national cybersecurity coordinator will be appointed today as the government wants to better prevent large-scale data breaches of people’s personal details.

The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, said it would have made a “huge difference” had the new coordinator and agency been in place when the Optus and Medibank cyber attacks occurred last year:

When Optus hit – much to my shock as cybersecurity minister – there was no cyber emergency response function in the Australian government.

I’m really angry about that. Those events were completely foreseeable events that were completely not foreseen by the previous government.

Now we dealt with those incidents well, but that is in spite of government structures, not because of them. Literally cabinet ministers stepped in and managed the incident in a way that is not sustainable when we are under basically relentless cyber attack.

So what we will have now is an individual in the public service who is going to coordinate the response across government and make sure that not only are we deterring and preventing cyber attack – we’re not going to reduce cyber risk to zero – that Australians can get up off the mat quickly get services restored, get their data protected, get their identity numbers changed. These are the sorts of things that this person would have been able to do much more seamlessly.

Labor’s lead narrows a month out from NSW election

The NSW Coalition government appears to be closing the gap on Labor less than a month before voters decide who will lead the state for the next four years, a key poll shows.

The Newspoll survey of 1,014 voters published in the Australian shows primary support for Labor has fallen by four percentage points since September to 36%, while the Coalition has gained two points to 37%.

Premier Dominic Perrottet has increased his lead as preferred premier over opposition leader Chris Minns to 43% versus 33%.

In September Perrottet led his opposition counterpart by 39% to 35%.

But on a two-party-preferred basis Labor leads the government on 52% versus 48%, the poll published today found.

If replicated across the state on election day on 25 March, Labor could win 42 seats and the Coalition 41, with crossbenchers likely to decide which party will form government.

The Newspoll was conducted between 20 and 23 February.

– AAP

‘It really was a war zone’

On the state of thousands still displaced a year on from the northern rivers floods, Murray Watt had this to say:

There has been substantial progress in the recovery. When those floods hit we were talking about something like 18,000 people who’ve been displaced from their homes across Queensland and New South Wales and obviously the numbers now are far fewer than that, but we have to be honest and acknowledge that there are people still living in situations that none of us would want to be living in.

So we do continue to work with the New South Wales government to get people back in their homes as quickly as possible. But I guess it does reflect that just the sheer scale of this event.

I’ll never forget the scenes that I saw and it’s more when I arrived there. It really was a war zone whether you’re talking about the CBD or particularly places like South and North Lismore, which were just completely destroyed.

And unfortunately, you know, as much as we might like to think that people would be back in their homes immediately, it does take a bit of time. But every time I go there, I’m reminded of the urgency of getting things moving. I had another meeting with the NSW Reconstruction Commission, when I was there last week, to say if there’s anything we can be doing at a federal level to help with it.

Watt says the buy backprogram is “definitely further advanced in Queensland than it is in New South Wales” and expects the uptake in NSW to accelerate after 3oo to 400 offers are made by the end of AprilL

But if the Queensland experiences any guide, once those offers do start being made, they do accelerate, and I’d certainly be hopeful that will happen in New South Wales as well.

Flood recovery funding

The federal and NSW government have unveiled a $300m disaster recovery program in a bid to end the northern rivers’ cycle of repair/damage/repair after floods.

Emergency management minister Murray Watt is speaking to ABC radio a year after the devastating floods.

Asked about whether this funding is only a drop in the ocean when a report out in January estimated the cost of the northern rivers flood disaster at close to $10bn, Watt insists the funding from governments has made a substantial difference, “but the reality is that the damage was immense and it can’t be fixed immediately”.

Watt says this new funding will be different because the focus will be on building back not as it was before, but with better standards of flood mitigation:

What’s different about the funding that we’re announcing today with the NSW government is that we’re not just repairing roads and bridges and causeways to the same standard they were, which only guarantees that they’re going to flood again in the future.

We’re actually making them more resilient so that when we do face future flooding, we hopefully can protect people a lot better than they were protected last time around …

This kind of long-term thinking is something that we haven’t really seen enough of at the federal level. And we’re now partnering actively with state governments, we’ve approved similar programs in Queensland and other states as well, because we want to make sure when we are spending what is literally billions of dollars recovering from these events, that we actually think about the future and try to limit that damage further down the track as well.

Josh Butler

Josh Butler

$25m for Alice Springs community organisations

The government is committing $25m to community organisations in Alice Springs as part of the federal response to alcohol-related crime and anti-social behaviour in the Northern Territory.

The money is to provide funding certainty for organisations running wellbeing projects, remote outreach programs and alcohol projects. The funds were announced this month by Anthony Albanese but the specific organisations to receive the cash have now been named.

Indigenous Australians minister Linda Burney said the funding represented a two-year extension, which she said would “give organisations the certainty they need and allow them to continue the important work they’re doing”:

Certainty in access to safety and community wellbeing services is critical for First Nations communities, especially children and young people living in and around Alice Springs.

Marion Scrymgour, Labor MP for the NT seat of Lingiari, said the groups getting funding were “are at the coalface of the challenges facing our region”:

Having spent a lot of time with community organisations – I know how hard they work for our community.

The organisations being funded include $6.3m for the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress Aboriginal Corporation, for transport, alcohol, violence intervention and family violence services; $1.3m for the Akeyulerre Aboriginal Corporation, for wellbeing and self-reliance projects; $2.6m for Bushmob Aboriginal Corporation, for remote outreach and youth residential rehabilitation; and $2.6m for drug and alcohol services for prisoners and transitional programs.

Future emissions from coal and gas production ‘likely to dwarf estimates’

Adam Morton

Adam Morton

Future emissions from existing and new Australian coal and gas production are likely to dwarf official government estimates and undermine the Albanese government’s planned revamp of the climate change policy known as the safeguard mechanism, according to a new analysis.

The analysis by the global research firm Climate Analytics, commissioned by climate groups, comes at the start of a two-day parliamentary inquiry hearing into the government’s planned changes to the scheme.

The safeguard is a Coalition policy that was proposed to limit pollution from 215 major industrial facilities but hasn’t. You can read about its history and Labor’s plan here.

The Climate Analytics report, commissioned by the Solutions for Climate Australia, said the government appeared to have substantially underestimated the likely future emissions from coal and liquefied natural gas production.

It said official projections for the LNG industry suggested a 20% rise by 2030. Climate Analytics estimated the increase above 2021 levels was likely to be 36%.

For coalmines, the government projected a 10% fall in emissions. Climate Analytics projected at least a 23%, and possibly up to a 116%, increase.

The report did not look directly at the economic impact on proposed developments of companies being required to either make deeper emissions cuts each year, or to effectively pay for cuts elsewhere by buying carbon offsets. But Climate Analytics’ chief executive Bill Hare said he believed the likely result for fossil fuels developments would be rising direct emissions and a “free for all” of offset use:

The safeguard mechanism will therefore not work to drive emissions down as it’s supposed to, particularly given the integrity issues found to be widespread within Australia’s offset scheme by independent experts.

You can read about what could happen given Labor has ruled out banning new fossil fuel projects here.

Josh Butler

Josh Butler

Press freedom roundtable

Attorney general Mark Dreyfus will today convene a press freedom roundtable in Parliament House, saying journalists should never be “charged or even jailed just for doing their jobs”.

Major outlets including Guardian Australia, the ABC, News Corp, Nine, SBS and Seven will attend the meeting, which the government announced last month. At the time, Dreyfus said the government “believes a strong and independent media is vital to democracy and holding governments to account”, and said improved protections for press freedom were needed.

“The Albanese Government intends to progress legislative reform as a priority,” he said, with Monday’s meeting to discuss options for reform.

The meeting will bring together two dozen organisations and companies, including the Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom, the Right to Know Coalition, the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, the Press Council, AAP, Australian Radio Network, First Nations Media, Private Media and Solstice Media.

Dreyfus said:

I’m looking forward to a full and frank discussion about press freedom issues in Australia and further options for reform. A strong and independent media matters.

There is agreement across the Parliament and the community that improved protections are overdue. Unlike the former government, which ignored successive bipartisan committee reports, the Albanese Government will progress press freedom reform as a priority.

Good morning!

Future emissions from existing and new Australian coal and gas production are likely to dwarf official government estimates, new analysis shows.

It could undermine the Albanese government’s planned revamp of the climate change policy known as the safeguard mechanism, according to global research firm Climate Analytics.

The research has been commissioned by climate groups and comes at the start of a two-day parliamentary inquiry hearing into the government’s planned changes to the scheme.

Also out today, the government is setting up a new agency set up to tackle mass cyber attacks, with the with prime minister Anthony Albanese today announcing the establishment of a coordinator for cybersecurity.

The announcement of the new post as well as the release of a discussion paper about a new cybersecurity strategy will be made at the cybersecurity roundtable in Sydney today, which will be attended by business, security and tech leaders, as well as home affairs minister Clare O’Neil.

O’Neil told ABC Radio the new agency would attempt to provide strategy and structure when cyber attacks occur as well as ensuring different parts of the government were effectively communicating with each other.

Emergency management minister Murray Watt will be speaking to ABC Radio shortly a year, on from the Northern Rivers flood disaster. We’ll bring you what he has to say.

In Melbourne last night thousands of friends, family and fans gathered for a last farewell for Dame Olivia Newton John at her state memorial, which included speeches from her husband and daughter, as well as music from her friend Delta Goodrem.

Let’s get into it.




Source link

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *