Lawyers who are made privy to the identity of police phone bugging and surveillance targets will face up to two years’ jail if they disclose the information, the Victorian government says.
The minister responsible for the establishment of an anti-corruption commission, Andrew McIntosh, has released the legislation setting up public interest monitors (PIMs).
The PIM, and his or her deputies, will attend court and tribunal hearings where police or Office of Police Integrity (OPI) representatives apply for permission to tap someone’s phone or track them using surveillance devices.
They will also appear at warrant applications made by the yet to be established Independent Broadbased Anti-Corruption Commission.
The draft law follows Ombudsman George Brouwer’s finding earlier this month that there was an accountability gap regarding telephone intercepts in Victoria.
He recommended the government develop measures to allow the merit of telecommunication intercepts to be assessed.
Mr McIntosh told the parliament the PIMs would be lawyers who would have to act independently and not be employed by the commonwealth, the state or the Office of Public Prosecutions.
They would attend application hearings in the courts where they would have the right to question warrant applicants and have access to a copy of the application and any affidavit.
If a PIM disclosed the sensitive information to others they would face two years’ jail.
Mr McIntosh said last year alone Victoria Police and the OPI made 424 applications for telecommunications interception warrants and all had been granted.
It was a similar situation with surveillance device warrants.
“Covert investigation and coercive powers, such as surveillance devices (and) telecommunications interceptions … are among the most intrusive powers available to integrity and law enforcement bodies in Victoria,” he said.
“Strong accountability measures should exist for the use of such significant powers.”
The legislation will be debated in the lower house next month.
Magazine reports that the IRA had tapped into a secure line between Dundalk Garda Station and Newry police were discounted at the Smithwick Tribunal this morning.
Telecommunications engineer Tom Roddy who spent 37 years based in Dundalk said if the IRA had tapped the secure line by gaining access to the telephone in Dundalk “the evidence would be still there today”.
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THE Victorian Ombudsman has admitted he is unable to determine whether the Office of Police Integrity was justified in bugging the phones of former police deputy commissioner Ken Jones, concluding that no agency has the power to properly scrutinise its use of telephone intercepts.
Ombudsman George Brouwer yesterday confirmed that the OPI investigated an allegation of serious misconduct against Sir Ken and placed him under surveillance.
Mr Brouwer, who was the inaugural director of the OPI before his appointment as Ombudsman, said all details of the surveillance, including use of any telephone intercepts, were “blacked out” from documents passed to his office by the OPI, and that he had to rely on media reports to conduct his investigation.
He said he was informed by the OPI that the heavy redaction of surveillance documents was required by federal law.
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The Victorian government has backtracked on claims it would directly brief the new phone bugging and surveillance watchdog.
The minister responsible for the establishment of an anti-corruption commission, Andrew McIntosh, introduced a bill into parliament on Thursday to establish a body called the Public Interest Monitor (PIM).
The PIM will be made up of lawyers registered to appear in courts and tribunals to test the merits of applications from Victoria Police, the Office of Police Integrity (OPI) and the yet to be established Independent Broadbased Anti-Corruption Commission for permission use phone bugging and surveillance devices during investigations.
Mr McIntosh told reporters it would be the state government, probably himself, who would brief the PIMs.
“It will probably be, no doubt, the minister responsible for the establishment of the anti-corruption commission or it may be the department,” he told reporters.
“But the reality is, you know, it will be the government that will do the briefing of the person to appear on behalf of the public interest.”
Later, after the opposition accused him of politicising the new body, Mr McIntosh told parliament he had made a mistake during the heated press conference.
“The Public Interest Monitor will be completely independent of government,” he said.
“The fact is there will be no briefing … there will be absolutely no input from the government agency, minister or department whatsoever.”
Opposition anti-corruption commission spokeswoman Jill Hennessy seized on Mr McIntosh’s gaffe.
“We have to remember so-called independent bodies may indeed have to investigate their masters, that is the government,” she told reporters.
“It’s quite extraordinary for a minister to suggest that it would be he who would be issuing the instructions to a so-called independent body.”
A spokesman for Mr McIntosh said PIMs would have access to documents presented to the court or tribunal by the police or integrity body in their application.
They will be bound by confidentiality rules and could be jailed for a year for breaching those obligations.
Mr McIntosh rejected suggestions the government did not trust judges to properly take into account the public interest when deciding whether or not to grant phone tap and surveillance device warrant applications.
But he said none of the 424 applications made by Victoria Police and the OPI for telephone intercept warrants were rejected in 2009-10, and only two of 141 applications for surveillance device warrants were knocked back.
Mr McIntosh continued to refuse to reveal when he expected the IBAC would be operational, only saying the legislation would be introduced into parliament before Christmas.
Before winning office, the Baillieu government promised the IBAC would be operational by July this year.
The Israel Police have arrested 22 people suspected of distributing and installing smartphone bugging software. The police searched 11 bugging equipment businesses and private investigators. The gag order on the case was lifted today. The Police National Fraud Squad and Computer Crimes Division carried out the investigation.
The suspects allegedly distributed and installed the bugging equipment, and even advertised their product on the Internet. They are suspected of planting bugging software, bugging, and invasion of privacy.
The police say that the software was designed to be used in two ways on smartphones: controlling spyware, which sent information about all incoming and outgoing calls and SMS. On the basis of this information, the victims’ smartphones could be controlled to hear conversations in real time as well as turn them into remote listening devices to bug the surroundings. Another software sent this and other information, such as GPS data, to a special Gmail address set up for the listener.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news – www.globes-online.com – on September 19, 2011
