Submission regarding the review into the Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Act 2021
The Independent National Security Legislation Monitor is reviewing the Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) laws, which gave the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) unprecedented and invasive powers to monitor online activity, access data, and take over a person's online account.
The Human Rights Law Centre is calling for stronger safeguards for the right to privacy and warned that these powers enable the AFP and ACIC to undertake significant invasions of privacy, encroach on the right to privacy, and threaten to have a chilling effect on the work of journalists and their sources.
Our submission recommends:
the establishment of an independent advocate, a public interest monitor, to review warrant applications;
significant narrowing of the wide range of offences for which the warrants can currently be issued; and
safeguards that limit the use of intrusive powers after all other avenues to achieve the same results have been exhausted.
The Human Rights Law Centre raised these significant concerns when the laws were introduced three years ago, pointing to the disproportionality and insufficient safeguards, but these concerns were largely ignored.