> 2038: all visits to all sites will be recorded
That's been the case since 2015. ISPs are required to record customer ID, record date, time and IP address and retain it for two years to be accessed by government agencies. It was meant to be gated by warrants, but a bunch of non-law-enforcement entities applied for warrantless access, including local councils, the RSPCA (animal protection charity), and fucking greyhound racing. It's ancient history, so I'm not sure if they were able to do so. The abuse loopholes might finally be closed up soon though.
https://privacy108.com.au/insights/metadata-access/
https://delimiter.com.au/2016/01/18/61-agencies-apply-for-me...
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-01-18/government-releases-l...
https://ia.acs.org.au/article/2023/government-acts-to-finall...
We already reached that point several years ago.
Block lists are not new. For example Italy blocks a number of sites, usually at DNS level with the cooperation of ISPs and DNS services. You can autotranslate this article from 2024 to get the gist of what is being blocked and why https://www.money.it/elenco-siti-vietati-italia-vengono-pers...
I believe other countries of the same area block sites for similar reasons.
As others have said, that's the case already and not just in Australia. Same in lots of other places like the UK and the whole EU. Less so in the US (though they can demand any data the ISP has, and require ISPs to collect data on individuals)
> Australia is quietly extremely authoritarian.
It is weird, as a recent-ish migrant I do agree, there are rules for absolutely bloody everything here and the population seems in general to be very keen on "Ban it!" as a solution to everything.
It's also rife with regulatory capture - Ah, no mate, you can't change that light fitting yourself, gotta get a registered sparky in for that or you can cop a huge fine. New tap? You have to be kidding me, no, you need a registered plumber to do anything more than plunger your toilet, and we only just legalised that in Western Australia last year.
It's been said before, but at some point the great Aussie Larrikin just died. The Wowsers won and most of them don't even know they're wowsers.
Electrical work can be pretty dangerous...
The reasoning is often “people might contaminate the water supply for a whole street!” Which just points to poor provision of one way valves at the property line.
But yeah, illegal.
I agree there are limits with what you want to do on electricity, but turning the breaker off and replacing a light fitting or light switch is pretty trivial. And I know people do just get on with it and do some of this stuff themselves anyway.
Was particularly pissed off that in January this year the plumbing “protections” were extended to rural residents who aren’t even connected to mains water or sewage, to protect us from substandard work by … making it illegal for us to do it ourselves. Highly annoying.
I assume that in your post "WA" means Western Australia -- as I can't imagine this kind of absurd protectionism law flying in Washington state, even though it's a little more paternalistic than average for the US.
And of course not! As mentioned - the rule has even recently been extended to 'protect' people like us who live semi off-grid, with rainwater capture for drinking and a septic system.
Australians really seem to loooooove rules.
And of course, for the most part, nobody's actually checking this stuff and people pay varying levels of attention to the rules. Seems like a waste of time all round.
A lot of laws can be interpreted as reccomendations :)
Total rort.
> your browser history may be used as evidence in a criminal case
Already the case. Mostly for the kind of dumb criminal who is suspected of murder and has been found googling "defences to murder" and "how to hide a body".
> the companies providing the logins must provide government with the identities
If there's a court order (good) or a national security letter (occasionally good but very open to abuse). Maybe the NSA or some guy in DOGE has automatic API access to this data anyway.
> you must be logged in to visit these specific sites where you might see naked boobies, and if you're under age you can't - those sites must enforce logins and age limits
Already the case for youtube and reddit content marked NSFW - either by the creator or by a fairly stupid algorithm. (You can see these boobies, but not those ones.) But the age verification is mostly "open a new account and enter a birth date". Also reddit has the dumbest age verification/login bypass ever. (Your honor, editing an URL is nation-state level hacking and we can't reasonably defend against that.)
> all visits to all sites will be recorded
Something something Permanent Record.
> you must have a valid login with one of these providers in order to use the internet
Ok this one is cheating a bit, but don't you need a google (or samsung etc.) account to set up an android let alone access the internet?
Also cheating a bit but you need a login and contract with your ISP to get on the internet too.
I would like to say "It is all because of X political party!" but both the majors are the same in this regard and they usually vote unanimously on these things.
Some states in the US are doing this already. And I think I saw a headline about some country in Europe trying to put Twitter in that category, implying they have such rules there already.
Not quietly, I don't think. Not like Australia is known for freedom and human rights. It's known for expeditionary wars, human rights abuses, jailing whistleblowers and protesters, protecting war criminals, environmental and social destruction, and following the United States like a puppy.
Pretty sure google searches have been used in murder trials before, including the mushroom poisoning one going on right now in Victoria.
It seems quite likely that governments want to continuously chip away at privacy.
Not a convincing take.
Its more of a constantly lowering bar, not a slippery slope that just needs to be stopped once.
Or in words you might find more appealing: Its worse than a slippery slope.
2027: the companies providing the logins must provide government with the identities
2028: because VPNs are being used to circumvent the law, if the logging entity knows you're an Australian citizen, even if you're not in Australia or using an Aussie IP address then they must still apply the law
2030: you must be logged in to visit these specific sites where you might see naked boobies, and if you're under age you can't - those sites must enforce logins and age limits
2031: Australian ISPs must enforce the login restrictions because some sites are refusing to and there are loopholes
2033: Australian ISPs must provide the government with a list of people who visited this list of specific sites, with dates and times of those visits
2035: you must be logged in to visit these other specific sites, regardless of your age
2036: you must have a valid login with one of these providers in order to use the internet
2037: all visits to all sites must be logged in
2038: all visits to all sites will be recorded
2039: this list of sites cannot be visited by any Australian of any age
2040: all visits to all sites will be reported to the government
2042: your browser history may be used as evidence in a criminal case
Australian politicians, police, and a good chunk of the population would love this.
Australia is quietly extremely authoritarian. It's all "beer and barbies on the beach" but that's all actually illegal.