ASIO urges govt to tighten security on Internet servers
cyber-risk that worries agencies is the emergence of anarchic
non-state organisations motivated to dislocate our way of life to
express dissent about public decisions. The most high-profile example
is Anonymous, a cellular and leaderless group of hactivists.
Attorney-General Nicola Roxon has referred the proposals to the
Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. She
recognises that a signal issue remains – “whether the government needs
to obligate the telecommunications industry to protect their networks
from unauthorised interference”.
It’s global cyber war out there, Financial Review, Christopher Joye, 1
Jan 13, “……with the privatisation
of so many utilities over the past three decades, government has
unwittingly delegated national security to business. …..ASIO
believes national security reforms need to be made to the regulations
governing essential infrastructure, including telecommunications….. Continue reading
Australian government considering changes to communications and privacy laws
Australia’s electronic spy agency, the Defence Signals Directorate, (DSD) is Australia’s equivalent to America’s National Security Agency( NSA) and has no qualms advertising its twin missions: “One is collecting foreign intelligence by interception. The other is working to stop people doing the same to us,” Burgess says….. The ordinarily shadowy DSD has published a detailed study on its top 35 cyber “mitigation strategies”.
Under Operation Australia, which has protested new data retention proposals, Anonymous shut down more than 10 Australian government sites, including ASIO’s, in July last year using denial of service attacks.
ASIO advocates reforms to communications and privacy laws to provide basic cyber-insurance.
Attorney-General Nicola Roxon has referred the proposals to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.
It’s global cyber war out there, Financial Review, Christopher Joye, 2 Jan 13,
“..Australia’s most experienced spy master, the director-general of ASIO, David Irvine, has a lot on his mind
…… with the privatisation of so many utilities over the past three decades, government has unwittingly delegated national security to business.
This is why ASIO believes national security reforms need to be made to the regulations governing essential infrastructure, including telecommunications.
“The more rocks we turn over in cyberspace, the more we find . . . the internet and increased connectivity has expanded infinitely the opportunities for [these threats]”, Irvine says. Continue reading
Spying operations targeted Australian businesses
BHP and Rio’s networks were infiltrated by Chinese hackers. The campaign also expanded to both companies’ advisers.
The Wikileaks cables revealed that BHP boss Marius Kloppers told a US consul-general in Melbourne that he was so fearful of Chinese spying that he shifted his export contracts to market prices because arms-length negotiations were impossible
It’s global cyber war out there, Financial Review, Christopher Joye, 2 Jan 2013, “:……….OPERATION AUSTRALIA There are a range of cyber-menaces that keep Australia’s spooks awake at night. The first is the usual state-on-state espionage. When officials refer to the “big C”, they are not talking about cancer.
Notwithstanding rhetoric from businesses keen to promote prosperous relations with the Middle Kingdom, the national security community says China is responsible for cyberthefts of Australian assets at every imaginable level. Continue reading
Do not be taken in by the lies in the pro nuclear Zero Carbon Option report
This report emanates from Australia’s top nuclear lobby group. Their web titles are Decarbonise South Australia, and Brave New Climate.
Based in South Australia, and with Barry Brook as their prime spokesman, they pose as Climate Change activist sites. But , after you’ve got through all that worthy climate and renewable energy stuff – comes the real message – nuclear power for Australia (and the world)
Below some points from the Zero Carbon Options report. Do not be taken in by these lies
“Capacity Factor: Renewables – 30%. Nuclear – 85%
>
>Job Creation: Renewables – 360 permanent jobs, 1300 jobs in construction.
>Nuclear – 520 permanent jobs, 1600 jobs in construction.
>
>Lifespan: Renewables – 25 years. Nuclear – 60 years.
>
>Cost: Renewables – $8.1 billion. Nuclear – $4.8 billion
>The Zero Carbon Options report, amongst other things, seriously questions why BZE ignores the option of nuclear power if their aim is to decarbonise Australia.
Some on the left also include the demand of “100% renewable energy” in their day to day campaigns. The Zero Carbon Options team, amongst others, have warned that relying on only one form of technology to produce zero carbon power is unwise, and could even be irresponsible. “ – Christina Macpherson 12 Dec 12,
In disastrous uranium market climate, uranium companies in cut throat competition
Did rivals try to scupper BHP’s uranium sale to Cameco?Mining.com, Frik Els | November 23, 2012 The West Australian reports rumours have been circulating in the state’s mining community that Rio Tinto (NYSE:RIO) and Paladin Energy
(TSX:PDN) attempted to sabotage BHP Billiton’s (LON:BHP) $448 million sale of uranium property Yeelirrie to Canada’s Cameco (TSX:CCO)….. The paper said Rio denied the rumours while none of the other parties commented, and that the deal is likely to be OK’d in any event.
Spot uranium prices have been drifting towards the $40 per pound level this year – well below the $66.50 prior to Fukushima disaster in Japan and down from historic high levels above $130 in 2007.
Last year nuclear power consumption declined 4.3%, the largest drop-off on record, said BP in its annual study of global energy use. Japan cut back nuclear power by 44.3%, and Germany reduced nuclear consumption by 23.2%.
http://www.mining.com/did-rivals-try-to-scupper-bhps-uranium-sale-to-cameco-87504/
Rio Tinto and Paladin Energy try to scuttle Cameco’s uranium mining plans in W.A.
there’s speculation the miners, who own their own uranium deposits, did not want Yeelirrie developed because of the already weak fundamentals in the uranium sector.
Paladin and Rio attempt to block BHP deal
http://www.miningaustralia.com.au/news/paladin-and-rio-attempt-to-block-bhp-deal 23 November, 2012 Andrew Duffy Rio Tinto and Paladin Energy have attempted to scuttle BHP Billiton’s $430 million sale of the Yeelirrie uranium deposit to Canadian giant Cameco. Continue reading
Australia’s public liars being exposed
IPA falsifiers fear fact checking fad Independent Australia 19 November, 2012 Serial deceivers, the Institute of Public Affairs, appear decidedly nervous about the prospect of fact checking coming to Australia, reports Alan Austin.
WATCHING the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) become appalled at the threat of fact checking coming to Australia has been one of this year’s more entertaining media experiences. Writing on The Drum online last week, IPA research fellow and (according to his bio on The Drum*) editor of the IPA Review, Chris Berg claimed fact checking – that is, ensuring what is written is actually true – is
‘…appealing in principle. It is disappointing – even futile – in practice.’
Well, of course it is ― to the IPA. Its Review almost rivals The Australian for distortions and falsehoods. Almost. Its writers almost match Andrew Bolt for fabrications. Well, no, not really………
Even pro-Republican Fox News called Romney and Ryan out on their multiple fabrications.
Steve Benen’s influential website meticulously documented Romney’s porkies throughout the 2012 presidential campaign. He ended up with a total of 917 by election day ― a tally that would make even Australia’s “Lying Rodent” blush.
Most commentators assess this to have been a factor in the huge win for President Obama. How significant it was, of course, impossible to measure.
More urgently for Australia’s IPA, recent focus on the lies of their pal, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott, has coincided with a dramatic fall in his approval rate to new record lows. Just coincidence? Again, hard to be certain. But the IPA is nervous……
Fact checkers are required primarily for calling out lies — deliberate statements of falsehood, made knowingly by politicians, the media and public commentators.
Australia, the USA and Britain today are rife with fabricators.
Journalists lie about public figures, about climate change and about Aboriginal people.
The IPA routinely fabricates and distorts in its advocacy on behalf of its undisclosed clients on tobacco marketing, internet privacy, climate change, controls over shonky charities and many other matters.
These are profound challenges facing Australia, the USA and Britain. Fact checkers can help us deal with them. http://www.independentaustralia.net/2012/business/media-2/ipa-falsifiers-fear-fact-checking-fad/
Is the Australian government manipulating Aboriginal Northern Land Council on nuclear waste dump plans?
Government got it wrong on Muckaty, commission needed to reach radioactive waste solution 07 Nov 2012 | Scott Ludlam The Greens have called on the Federal Government to come clean on whether it is behind moves by the Northern Land Council to nominate a new site on Muckaty station for a Radioactive Waste Dump.
“The Government is clearly terrified it may lose a Federal Court action launched by Traditional Owners of the area. Remarkably, just when the Commonwealth’s desperate proposal finally comes apart at the seams, NT Chief Minister Terry Mills has surrendered and now claims to support the dump. Chief Minister Mills has met with Minister Martin Ferguson – cutting a deal in Canberra to the exclusion of the local community.
“In March 2012 the Greens moved amendments for an independent commission on radioactive waste but hit a wall of opposition from the Labor Party and the Coalition.
“This Commission would apply world’s best practice to responsibly deal with Australia’s radioactive waste inventory, which may have to involve a more sophisticated management regime than dumping the waste containers in a shed on a cattle station.
“This latest move for an alternate site replicates the same tactics that sparked the Muckaty debacle in the first place. It is time to change the strategy. We need an approach that is democratic, fair, and scientifically sound.”
Don Argus, like Martin Ferguson, adds more lies about nuclear energy
Uranium ‘cheapest’ alternative fuel October 23, 2012 Tony 
Moore brisbanetimes.com.au senior reporter Uranium remained the cheapest of the alternative fuels, one of Australia’s leading business figures, Don Argus, said today.
However restrictions on shipping and transport of uranium in several Australian states, including Queensland and Western Australia, remain.
Mr Argus, the former BHP Billiton chief executive, cautiously welcomed Queensland’s possible re-entry to uranium mining.
Mr Argus however decried governments’ lack of focus on Australia’s natural gas reserves.
“Uranium is still the cheapest of the so-called alternative energy sources,” Mr Argus said. “But I am surprised that governments haven’t adjusted to the gas option as distinct from what appears to be, in
some cases, inefficient renewable energy in the form of wind farms.” http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/uranium-cheapest-alternative-fuel-20121023-2838o.html#ixzz2AWguXGhW
Aw gee shucks when I say “No” to nuclear, I mean “Yes” – Martin Ferguson
Ferguson says no to nuclear power THE AUSTRALIAN AAP October 24 The Australian government remains opposed to nuclear power, Resources Minister Martin Ferguson says. RESOURCES Minister Martin Ferguson has ruled out Australia pursuing nuclear energy as an increasing number of states open the door to uranium mining.
Queensland Premier Campbell Newman on Monday reneged on an election commitment to uphold a 30-year ban on uranium mining in his state, saying Mr Ferguson’s urging and the federal government’s moves to sell uranium to India prompted his decision.
Mr Ferguson told the National Carbon Capture Storage (CCS) Conference in Perth on Tuesday that a wide range of clean energy technologies including CCS would be part of the nation’s future, but not nuclear power, which was expected to fall in cost.
“The Australian government has basically said we are committed to all potential forms of clean energy from an innovative point of view, other than nuclear, which is a proven clean energy technology,” he told reporters…..
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/breaking-news/ferguson-says-no-to-nuclear-power/story-fn3dxiwe-1226501691026
Queensland’s scandalous uranium history: a bad idea to start it again
Queensland Forgets Its Uranium History http://newmatilda.com/2012/10/24/queensland-forgets-its-uranium-history Jim Green, New Matilda, 24 Oct 2012 The Queensland Government is unwise to reverse the ban against uranium mining and there is no stronger reason than the industry’s sordid track record in the state.
French company Minatome undertook trial mining at Ben Lomond, near Townsville, in the early 1980s. Federal MP Bob Katter spoke at length about Ben Lomond in Parliament on 1 November 2005. He noted that Minatome initially denied reports of a radioactive spill, but then changed its story and claimed that the spill posed no risk and did not reach the water system from which 210,000 people drank.
Bob Katter’s version of the story is on Hansard: “For the next two or three weeks they held out with that story. Further evidence was produced in which they admitted that it had been a dangerous level. Yes, it was about 10,000 times higher than what the health agencies in Australia regarded as an acceptable level. After six weeks, we got rid of lie number two. I think it was at about week 8 or week 12 when, as a state member of parliament, I insisted upon going up to the site. Just before I went up to the site, the company admitted — remember, it was not just the company but also the agency set up by the government to protect us who were telling lies — that the spill had reached the creek which ran into the Burdekin River, which provided the drinking water for 210,000 people. We had been told three sets of lies over a period of three months.”
Queensland’s other misadventure with uranium was the Mary Kathleen mine in western Queensland. In the mid-1970s, a whistleblower from Mary Kathleen Uranium Mining leaked documents which revealed the existence of a global uranium cartel leading to protracted international scandals and fines totalling hundreds of millions of dollars.
The leaked documents also revealed evidence of shoddy environmental practices at Mary Kathleen; close surveillance of environmental organisations; the close relationship between then-ACTU President Bob Hawke and the chairman of uranium miner Conzinc Riotinto Australia; and advice from government officials about how companies could circumvent non-proliferation treaties in order to sell uranium to countries that had not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
One million litres of radioactive liquid were released in February 1984 from Mary Kathleen’s evaporation ponds during a wet spell. Even now, 30 years after the mine’s closure, there is ongoing seepage of saline, metal and radionuclide-rich waters from tailings, as well as low-level uptake of heavy metals and radionuclides into vegetation.
Bob Katter’s son, state MP Rob Katter, claims that uranium mining represents a potential $20 billion export industry for Queensland which could generate 2600 jobs. The simple facts are that uranium accounts for just 0.2 per cent of Australia’s export revenue ($610 million in 2010-11) and less than 0.02 per cent of Australian jobs (1760 jobs including mining, exploration and regulation). Queensland is home to just 3 per cent of Australia’s uranium resources.
Rob Katter claims that Queenslanders support uranium mining but he provides no evidence. The latest poll reported in the Courier Mail in November 2008, found that 47 per cent of Queenslanders oppose uranium mining compared to 45 per cent in support. Two-thirds of Queenslanders oppose uranium sales to nuclear weapons states. A majority of Australians believe that the “safeguards” system, which aims to prevent nuclear weapons proliferation, is ineffective.
Before the last state election, the Queensland Liberal National Party said it had no intention of reversing the ban against uranium mining. Campbell Newman’s LNP Government ought to take its new position to the next state election. Better still, a referendum could be held on the question of uranium mining when Queenslanders next go to the polls.
The uranium industry has no capacity to deliver serious economic benefits to Queensland but, if given the chance, it will create more long-term environmental and public health hazards such as Ben Lomond and Mary Kathleen.
Dr Adi Paterson of Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation upset at being called a lying shit
Nuclear agency boss emotional as whistleblower taunts http://www.cootamundraherald.com.au/story/405017/nuclear-agency-boss-emotional-as-whistleblower-taunts/?cs=12 By Bianca Hall THE head of Australia’s nuclear agency briefly broke down at a dramatic Senate estimates hearing yesterday, after an angry whistleblower accused him of covering up a serious incident in which workers were splashed with radioactive material.
Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation chief executive Adrian Paterson was comforted by Senators and staff, and refused to leave the room until the man had left the building.
Listening to Mr Paterson give evidence was former ANSTO worker and whistleblower David Reid, who worked at the facility for almost 30 years, including years as his colleagues’ occupational health and safety representative.”You’re a liar,” Mr Reid growled when Mr Paterson finished telling the inquiry he did not believe the incident had occurred.
”You’ve fabricated the findings, covered up safety incidents … you guys covered it over. You’re a lying piece of shit.”
Mr Reid later told The Age he had been sacked after bringing claims of the incident to management. ”It’s trashed my life; I’ve just been obsessed with it. My marriage fell apart, and I lost my house and I’m living in a caravan. But I can’t let it go.”
KPMG conducted the most recent investigation into the incident, reporting in June that many current and former ANSTO employees had ”imprecise at best” recollections of the incident. But it found the regulator – the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency – failed to properly investigate the matter and neither its interim, nor final inspection reports, ”sufficiently examined allegations that a contamination incident … occurred”.
Greens Senator Scott Ludlam called for ANSTO to apologise to Mr Reid. ”I think what has to happen from here, Mr Reid is clearly owed an apology, but the regulator is going to have to step up.”
Australia’s Institute of Public Affairs campaigning to deny climate change
IPA goes up the greasy Delingpole for cash http://www.independentaustralia.net/2012/environment/ipa-goes-up-the-delingpole-for-cash/ 14 September, 2012 The IPA are grubbing for donations to fund their tireless campaign to stymie action on climate change — and are happy to fly out even the most obnoxious deniers from the UK to assist. Graham Readfearn reports.JAMES DELINGPOLE is a UK columnist waging a long personal jihad against wind farms, environmentalists and climate science.
A resident blogger and columnist at London’s Daily Telegraph, Delingpole is probably best known for being among the first mainstream columnists to declare – wrongly, of course – that emails illegally hacked from an influential climate research unit showed scientists were trying to con the public.
So he is the perfect person to be appealing for people to donate their cash to the Melbourne-based Institute of Public Affairs, a free market think tank which has been working for about 20 years on a campaign to mislead the public about climate science and the impact of carbon pricing.
In the appeal, Delingpole lauds the IPA’s campaign against climate science and action on climate change. Readers of the appeal might be forgiven for thinking the IPA is struggling for cash. Says Delingpole:
James Delingpole
‘Their budget is always stretched. If you don’t give them money they’ll go broke.’
Yet the IPA’s most recent financial returns to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission suggest that, rather than scrambling around for spare change, the think-tank is, in fact, in rude financial health.
For the year ending June 2011, the ASIC documents show the IPA declared a before-tax profit of $217,000 with an income of $2.42 million. In 2010, the IPA’s income was $1.72 million, with before-tax profit of $203,000.
The IPA’s executive director John Roskam refuses to declare where the IPA’s money comes from……
Professor Bob Carter, the IPA’s science policy advisor, is also an advisor to the GWPF (as well as at least seven other climate sceptic groups), alongside fellow Australian “sceptic” Professor Ian Plimer, who has also made personal appeals for people to hand over cash to the IPA.
As I revealed in a story for The Guardian in March, the only known funder of the GWPF is Michael Hintze, an Australian-born, UK-based, hedge fund manager, donor to the UK Tory Party, and a man with a personal fortune of $1.4 billion, according to Forbes.
The IPA also has close ties to the billionaire set in the form of Gina Rinehart, the coal and iron ore mining magnate and world’s richest woman. In an address to “IPA members and friends”, Rinehart recently declared her concern that Australia was becoming too expensive, given that “Africans want to work, and its workers are willing to work for less than $2 per day”. The comments prompted a Ugandan television personality to declare Rinehart was “removed from reality“.
The IPA is currently working in partnership with Rinehart’s lobby group Australians for Northern Development & Economic Vision, which wants a separate low-tax economic zone for the north of Australia to make it cheaper to run major mining projects.
Lies and coverups about radiation, from Maralinga to Fukushima
In 1953, Lallie Lennon was engulfed by a bomb fallout cloud. She became ill. She still suffers painful scars, though they have improved. From 1952 she began asking for a diagnosis. She asked throughout the 1950s, the 1960s, the 1970s. Not until the 1980s did she get an answer.
And then, the Young Doctors ignored radiation as a factor. They brushed aside her mention of the fallout which caused her health to decline and which caused her suffering. She is not the only one.
Nuclear sector seeks to regain trust after Fukushima< Paul Langley’s Nuclear History Blog, Sep 13, 2012
“……..Over the last year and a half I have watched world nuclear authorities act increasingly in the same manner as the British nuclear authorities acted in Australia. They lied about the amount and impact of fallout. They lied about the extent of contamination residue on land and in water and food.
They lied about casualities, they lied about and with held diagnosis for decades, they with held hospital records, they claim to have lost ALL of the Maraling nuclear test health records.
They claim radiation affected no nuclear veteran, even at the same time as they admit that nuclear veterans suffer 23% higher risk of disease. They are perplexed, in public about this. Even today, the land which British authorities claimed was perfectly clean,remains, forever, banned from permanent human use. Yet Aboriginal people, whose land it is, know very well that the game they catch up there may well British radionuclides in its flesh…… Continue reading
Australia colluded with USA against Iran
WikiLeaks cables show how Australia works with the US to get Iran , September 5, 2012 Green Left By Linda Pearson WikiLeaks cables show Australian officials have colluded with the US to get the IAEA to declare Iran in breach of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Barely 10 years after false claims about weapons of mass destruction were used to justify the invasion of Iraq, a similar narrative is being used by politicians in the US and Israel to push the case for war with Iran. You might not know it from mainstream media reports, but Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program and, as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT ), has an inalienable right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes.
It’s thought that Israel has up to 400 active warheads but, unlike NPT signatories, the country has never agreed to open up its nuclear program to inspection. The US has about 2000 active warheads and is arguably in violation of the NPT itself for its failure to meet the disarmament requirement enshrined in Article VI of the treaty .
US President Barack Obama’s “Global Zero” initiative to rid the world of nuclear weapons has amounted to little more than rhetoric . A 2011 report by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said the US spends more money on nuclear weapons than the rest of the world combined.
In effect, two countries with a combined nuclear arsenal probably greater than any other are threatening war with another country because it may have the capacity to develop nuclear weapons in the future. This would be yet another illegal war of aggression, the “supreme international crime” as defined at Nuremberg.
WikiLeaks has given us unprecedented access to information with which to challenge the self-conferred moral authority of the US and its allies to decide which states can and cannot have nuclear weapons. Diplomatic cables from the US Embassy in Canberra published by WikiLeaks suggest Australia’s role in US relations with Iran is shaped by its slavish support for the US alliance and Israel, and its position as the world’s second biggest seller of uranium. Continue reading
1 This month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
15 April – Zoom –Nuclear Power is Not the Solution
Apr 15, 2026 01:00 AM in Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney
Join the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) on Tuesday, April 14th for a timely webinar exploring the risks associated with nuclear power and challenging the myth that it offers a simple, safe, carbon-free solution to the climate crisis
21 April Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-04-21 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-04-21 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
Event Type: Virtual
A virtual link will be communicated before the event.
Host Contact Info: australia@icanw.org
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 