An Australian law to expose vice annoys the tech world

MARK ZIRNSAK is a lonely man. In September he wrote to the government on behalf of the Uniting Church in Australia to endorse the Assistance and Access Bill passing through Parliament. The bill, he argued, would help fight crimes such as child pornography and human trafficking. The spread of such horrors is facilitated by “end-to-end” encryption, which allows people to communicate via social media without anyone else, including the police, being able to snoop on them. Forcing tech firms to provide a way for law-enforcers to peer into those encrypted spaces, as the bill does, is reasonable, Mr Zirnsak argued.

He was virtually on his own. Of the 343 letters sent to the government during the comment period, only his was in favour. The fear is that any peephole built for the good guys will inevitably be exploited by bad guys. Apple, an American tech giant, said the law would give the government “extraordinarily broad and vague powers”. Australian academics said it would have “serious negative consequences for the cyber-security of Australians”. Human-rights groups and lawyers railed.