Comment by robertwt7
18 days ago
I am Australian, the state that we have become is just sad. The fact that this is brought under the disguise of "child protection" is ridiculous and I never would have imagine a future in my own country where I have to submit my ID to access anything online. They will never achieve anything with this because everyone will just use VPN. It's costing taxpayer's money without any useful outcome. The level of incompetence displayed by this government is astonishing.
As an Australian, do you remember:
* The Labor government's failed 2010 internet filter policy, [1] "Those who claim the government's approach is akin to the sort of political censorship practiced by authoritarian regimes are simply misleading the Australian public."
* The Liberal government's passed 2015 mandatory metadata retention laws, [2] "Critics say Australia’s data retention scheme is mass surveillance, and metadata is used to track where people go."
because it doesn't seem like you do. I could also point to the UK's full-take surveillance apparatus, or the US, from around about the same time-frame.
This is a long term project.
[1] https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/internet-filter-is-not-c...
[2] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-08-17/metadata-retention-pr...
It boggles my mind that they gave police a legal avenue to take over accounts and modify data a few years later:
The Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Act 2021 (SLAID Act) introduced new powers for Australian law enforcement to combat serious cyber-enabled crime. These powers include data disruption warrants, network activity warrants, and account takeover warrants.
https://theconversation.com/facebook-or-twitter-posts-can-no...
Just a note - it's not just "this Government" - this is bipartisan and has a long history spanning decades. Both sides are just as incompetent as each other when it comes to technology and the Internet.
It's exactly the same kind of problem that we've always had here, summed up in 1964 by Donald Horne, "Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck. It lives on other people's ideas, and, although its ordinary people are adaptable, most of its leaders (in all fields) so lack curiosity about the events that surround them that they are often taken by surprise."
I guarantee this will be the response when this doesn't work - surprise. They'll claim it was a sure thing, that they did everything right (even though they went through multiple rounds of sham "public consultations" and ignored all the expert testimony)...
Australia is slowly copying China. They will move on banning VPNs in a year of two.
It may be government incompetence, but it might also be a plan to identify everyone online.
The same will come to Europe if citizens don't push back.
There was the push to intercept all chat traffic with ChatControl legislation.
And with Digital ID will come to identify all users on net.
Luckily the WHO takeover got push back in USA and many other states, don't know for Australia
The truly demoralising thing is that you can move to the more or less exact other side of the planet and you have the exact same shit going on.
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I’m not sure if there is some super secret hidden motive / conspiracy here but I do know that the internet and social media is basically poisoning politics and society. Go read about what’s happening in Japan. Some loser started a political party based on 100% lies about immigrants and vaccines destroying the country (sound familiar?) and just gained a huge share of votes in a small amount of time.
The argument you’re making is “freedom at all costs” the trouble with all of this is, can we even trust ourselves with this freedom. Your big brain might be immune to l the cruft out there but that’s not universal.
I honestly don’t know what the answer is but we’re in trouble. The reason China does what it does it not just because it’s an authoritarian hell hole, but because they know the games they play on others and don’t want it to happen to them.
I’m not sure if you’ve read 1984, but having our children brainwashed online is a great way to get us close to total authoritarianism, on the other hand you’re arguing that by having to ID yourself when logging on (let’s face it, that’s already happening) means we’re already in 1984?
> "100% lies about immigrants and vaccines"
There was frustration around the globe about pandemic policies. Specifically lockdowns, mask mandates, check-ins, and "no jab no job" ultimatums, which have since been identified in many places as excessive abuse of power that went beyond public health all the way into the social coercion manipulation zone.
On immigration, is it not worth listening to the concerns of locals on rising immigration numbers? On associated social unrest? Or do we label them "100% liars" and censor their words with mandated face-scanning and digital check-ins.
This how good lies work. You take an element of the truth and wrap it around the lie. Japan might very well be frustrated about immigrants but that doesn't make every complaint about immigrants true.
It would be really cool if you did some research before commenting.
They argue vaccines don't work and the reality is Japan's immigration numbers a minuscule and basically the only way to be in Japan as an immigrant is to have a visa and a job, or you're out. They don't have any "illegals".
Do you have any idea how important vaccines are in a country with a predominately old population and some of the lowest birth rates in the world?
Do you have any idea how important immigrant worker are in a country which is basically running out of workers?
These people don't really care about outcomes, they manipulate fools en masse to vote for them so they can get into power do corrupt / cruel shit. It's populism with zero practical implementation plan except being an asshole to the most vulnerable people in the country to keep xenophobes happy.
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Maybe, but the proposed cure is far, far worse than the disease. Hell, in your very post, you bemoan how untrustworthy and/or authoritarian governments and politicians are.. and the solution is to hand them more power, more surveillance?