Cyber world fears snoop law

By CHRIS BARTON, IT editor

Big Brother will soon be watching - and possibly hacking your PC and intercepting your e-mail en route - if the Government pushes through changes to the Crimes Act.

The amendments aim to make hacking and interception of email illegal.

But the Security Intelligence Service and the Government Communications Security Bureau will be exempted from the legislation's provisions. So too will the police, but only if they first obtain a search warrant.

The proposals - dubbed the "snoop bill" - have generated widespread concern among internet users, who fear the legislation makes it too easy for the Government to invade their right to online privacy.

The Green Party opposes the amendments, saying the main purpose is to allow snooping by security agencies and the police. It says the legislation should be put off until the Government makes it clear how it plans to implement the surveillance scheme.

"If overseas experience is anything to go by, these systems provide for large-scale interception, completely different from anything that the police have done in the past in terms of postal and telephone surveillance," said Green MP Keith Locke. "We see these new powers as much more open to abuse."

Last month, the British Government introduced its Regulation of Investigatory Powers (RIP) Bill to give police sweeping powers to access email and other encrypted internet communications.

The bill requires British internet providers to install "black boxes" which route all data traffic passing through their computers to the Government Technical Assistance Centre at the London headquarters of MI5.

In the United States, officials are trying to calm concerns about a new FBI internet-wiretapping system called Carnivore, which can apparently sift through vast amounts of email on an internet provider's server using keyword searches.

The proposed New Zealand amendments do not say how interception will occur, but put in place the legal framework for it by extending the definition of private communications to include email, faxes and pagers.

Information Technology Minister Paul Swain says now is not the time to debate the substance of the amendments.

That will occur when the bill is before the law and order select committee and when it is referred back to Parliament.

"We need to send a strong message that hacking is not cool, it is not clever, it is a serious crime," Mr Swain says.

The Government has promised to pass the Crimes Amendment Bill No 6 by June 30.

It will join other cyber-crime legislation, yet to be passed, which will outlaw accessing a computer system for dishonest purposes or to cause damage or interference.