michaelwyres.com.au | musings of a geek

Hypocritical Turnbull Strikes Again Over Quigley

NBN Co, the company building Australia’s National Broadband Network (NBN), this morning announced that founding CEO Mike Quigley, would be retiring from that position, after initially coming out of retirement in 2009 to head up the company.

“NBN Co CEO Mike Quigley today announced that he will retire from corporate life after four years leading the team that is building and operating Australia’s National Broadband Network.”

Note the specific use of the wording that “he will retire from corporate life“.

Malcolm Turnbull, the opposition communications spokesperson, and number one Quigley critic, was straight onto the front foot:

“Revolving doors at #NBN Co just as there are in the Labor caucus. How can project be a success when CEO gets fired?”

Note the specific use of the wording of “CEO gets fired“.

Nowhere in the NBN Co statement does it say Quigley was fired. Turnbull has zero evidence that Quigley was fired, and as such shouldn’t have said it.

Moreover, it has been Turnbull who has been after Quigley’s head on a platter ever since Tony Abbott famously ordered Turnbull to “demolish the NBN” when he became opposition communications spokesperson in 2010.

It is the height of hypocrisy for Turnbull to claim Quigley was “fired” – (which of course he wasn’t) – when it is what Turnbull has wanted all along.

Here on his own website, Turnbull claims Quigley wasn’t the right person for the job:

“JOURNALIST: What about Mike Quigley, would you sack him?”

“MALCOLM TURNBULL: We have not made any comments about that other than to say, and I’ve said it before and I have no regrets in saying that and I don’t back away from it, that I don’t think Mr Quigley was the right choice to be chief executive of this project because it is essentially a big construction project and while he has worked for a vendor, for Alcatel, and has sold a lot of equipment to people who have been building networks he’s never in his career been responsible for building a network or been responsible for running a telco. And that’s a fact.”

In April, Turnbull signalled “considerable changes” to the NBN Co board, should the opposition come to power in the upcoming federal election:

“”So yes I expect there will be considerable changes in the management level. As far as the board is concerned, I think you can assume there will be very considerable changes there.””

Given that he doesn’t “think Mr Quigley was the right choice to be chief executive”, it is not an unreasonable leap to conclude that the removal of Mike Quigley would have been part of the “considerable changes in the management level” of NBN Co.

The bottom line here is, Turnbull would have sought to remove Quigley from NBN Co, the moment he got his backside into the ministerial seat at DBCDE in the event of a Coalition win at the election.

That is, he would have fired him.

Yet he points out in a tweet of how unstable it makes NBN Co look by “firing” the CEO.

Hypocritical and disingenuous all the way.

Now, it is quite possible – (and in fact, likely) – that the ongoing political pressure with respect to the NBN project may have forced Quigley’s hand. Where has the majority of that political pressure been coming from?

Malcolm Turnbull.

It’s fair to say that Malcolm has gotten his way, but the grubby tactics from a man with far less credentials in communications, networks, and infrastructure delivery than Quigley have to be pointed out. Turnbull has taken down a good man for political points, and he should be ashamed.

But he won’t be.

Of course, the retirement of Quigley should not be a shock, given NBN Co has been actively involved in a search for a new CEO for some time:

“NBN Co chairwoman Siobhan McKenna has hired headhunter Egon Zehnder to find a replacement for chief executive Mike Quigley, sources close to the company say.”

Quigley didn’t come out of retirement in the first place just for the money, given his donation of his first $2 million annual salary to charity:

“He was independently wealthy after a long and successful career in the global telecommunications industry, but he took the job anyway, partly to move back to his native Australia. But he made it clear yesterday he still doesn’t need the taxpayer-funded salary that comes with it, donating his entire first-year pay cheque of $2 million to aid research into brain diseases and stroke rehabilitation.”

Given his 60 years, Quigley would likely have stepped down long before the 2021 NBN completion date, but a decent and honourable man has been shot down.

Enjoy your retirement Mike.

Time For Transparency On V/Line Punctuality

With the federal election approaching, the continuing Regional Rail Link (RRL) project in Victoria is likely to be in the news more and more, particularly since such a large slice of the funding comes from federal coffers.

From its own website, RRL is:

“Dedicated regional tracks will be built from West Werribee Junction to Deer Park, then along the existing rail corridor from Sunshine to Southern Cross Station. When complete, passengers on the Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat lines will have a streamlined journey through the metropolitan system.”

Though there are some criticisms – (such as trains no longer stopping at North Melbourne) – the value of the RRL project is quite clear. Separating regional and metropolitan trains will stop each from affecting the punctuality of the other. It is long overdue.

With RRL providing the means to significantly reduce the cause of the majority of V/Line delays, the State Government is already trying to preach that punctuality should improve:

“The State Government expects V/Line to face tighter measures of its punctuality when Victoria’s most expensive infrastructure project comes online.”

“Premier Denis Napthine and Public Transport Minister Terry Mulder, who have electorates on the Warrnambool line, said they were well aware of commuters’ frustration and anguish at poor-performing V/Line services but assured people it would get better.”

“Figures for May show V/Line services on the Geelong line for May were on time only 76.8 per cent of the time the worst result in the past 12 months.”

Seriously, given the cost, there will be some massive questions to answer if RRL doesn’t substantially fix the problem.

When punctuality results are published, all we see for each line is a “reliability” figure – (the percentage of regular scheduled services are actually run), and a “punctuality” figure – (the percentage of services that actually ran that ran “on-time”).

For most services, a train is considered “on-time” if it arrives within 5 minutes and 59 seconds of the scheduled time.

But that’s all we get.

No information about which particular services we’re late or didn’t run at all. Just a simple summary as a percentage.

In terms of punctuality, and the reporting thereof, I believe it is time for something new.

Transparency.

For most people, the simple numbers are enough – but how do we know these figures are correct and aren’t fudged anyway?

V/Line and State Government should make freely available, a full report on which services did and didn’t run, which services were “on-time” or not “on-time”, where problems occur, and the reasons for those problems.

It would be interesting to see if what V/Line tells customers at the time trains are cancelled or are running late, actually marry up to what such a report might contain.

Last night, the regular 4:19pm train from Southern Cross to Geelong was cancelled due to a locomotive failure. Things go wrong from time to time, and that’s okay.

Problems happen.

But how do I know this cancellation will be included in the next monthly “reliability” result?

Of course, I don’t.

In discussions with people I sit with on trains, not everyone is convinced the numbers are ridgey-didge. There often seems to be more cancellations than the number suggests.

It would also be nice to know which individual services are having the most problems and why. The 4:19pm has been regularly delayed this year due to the same faulty door which kept failing on carriage set “N9”, requiring substantial delays while the conductor secured the door.

Such data would allow the public who pay their money to travel to see what they are getting for their money. It would allow them to compare their own observations of the performance of the network, to what we hear officially.

That is, it will provide transparency.

If such data was available with respect to the 4:19 “door issue”, I suspect it would paint a damning picture of the lack of maintenance. I know from a number of conductors that the door problem was repeatedly reported to maintenance teams, but it still took many weeks to have it fixed.

If RRL is going to improve punctuality, lets have the data to prove it.

How about it V/Line?

Zumbo NBN Opinion Piece Has Fatal Flaw

Everyone – (and particularly media outlets) – has an opinion on the NBN. In a free democracy, having an opinion and being allowed to express it is a fundamental premise.

A opinion piece on the NBN by Frank Zumbo – (an associate professor at the school of business law and taxation at the University of New South Wales) – in this morning’s Fairfax press demonstrates this – but it would have helped if he knew what he was talking about:

“At the end of the day, a national high-speed broadband network is really all about access, convenience and affordability. What’s the point of building the most expensive fixed broadband network if it can only be accessed from your home?”

Say what? It can only be accessed from your home?

Frank should know – (by visiting the NBN website) – that it is designed for the home, and for businesses.

Where has he gotten this idea that it is only for the home? The premise of his opinion piece is fatally flawed.

The NBN goes to all Australian premises – homes, businesses, or otherwise.

Stick to business law and taxation at the University of New South Wales please Frank?

(UPDATED 08:18 04/07/2013): I have had a few more thoughts in regards to this opinion piece, and I think Zumbo is even “more wrong” about this than I first thought.

Others have suggested to me that Zumbo’s assertion that the NBN would “only be accessed from your home”, may actually have been a reference to a lack of consideration of “mobile broadband” in the government’s NBN plans.

Certainly, there is no consideration of this in the current NBN plan. Neither is there any consideration of this in the alternative Coalition plan. There has never been any suggestion that mobile services were or are to be addressed by the NBN.

We already have Telstra, Optus and Vodafone providing excellent 3G and 4G mobile data services to the Australian public. If you want mobile broadband, and that’s all you want – you are covered. Zumbo’s concerns – (if he was referring to mobile broadband) – are completely unfounded.

Whichever he meant, he has still gotten it all wrong.

Albanese Shafts The Iron Wires

Putting all seriousness over the NBN debate (mostly) aside for the moment, Anthony Albanese – (the current Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) – dragged up a great response to an NBN ‘Dorothy Dixer’ question in the House of Representatives yesterday:

Jokes aside, the speech was actually a fair point.

For the record, here is the hansard exceprt from 1910, quoted in the speech.

Brisbane Trip From Above

When flying, I prefer to take a window seat. Mainly because I feel more comfortable than when I’m in an aisle, with people brushing past up and down the plane.

I also prefer to being able to look outside and watch the world go by. I usually end up taking a few photos as well, and even the odd video. I like being able to look at the photos later, and figure out where the plane was on a map.

This first picture was taken near Murwillimbah in northern New South Wales, from QF600 (aircraft VH-VYG) on the way to Brisbane on a recent business trip, 06/06/2013:

The second was taken just after liftoff on the return flight, of the Brisbane River just south of the airport, from QF625 (aircraft VH-VXA), 07/06/2013:

My favourite shot from the trip was this awesome one of the impending sunset, taken near Undera in northern Victoria, also from QF625, 07/06/2013:

I even took a video of the landing at Melbourne Airport:

Dorky, but I enjoy it.

Snowden Passport Cancellation Irony

I read with a chuckle last night, a Bloomberg article reporting on the apparent cancellation of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden’s US passport.

“Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden’s U.S. passport has been revoked, according to a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity.”

On “condition of anonymity” hey? So presumably shouldn’t have been leaking such information?

Given Snowden has been accused of and charged with the leaking information regarding the NSA’s secret and warrantless program of internet and telephone surveillance, will they hunt down the person responsible for the leak of this information about the status of his passport?

I bet they don’t.

The Telstra Copper Ship Of Theseus

There were some interesting comments yesterday from Telstra CEO David Thodey, about his company’s opinion as to the state of the current copper Customer Access Network (CAN), the lines most of us use for telephone calls and internet access.

The condition of the network has been at the forefront of the alternative National Broadband Network (NBN) debate in recent times, with many questioning the ability of the CAN to deliver the speeds promised by the Coaltion’s FTTN plan, should they come to power at the September 14th federal election.

Thodey came out yesterday, stating he believe the CAN would be fine for 100 more years:

“Telstra CEO David Thodey has said that the company’s copper access network, which could be used under the Coalition’s fibre-to-the-node (FttN) alternative National Broadband Network (NBN) policy, could last for 100 more years and would not decompose.”

“Under the policy, instead of having fibre to the premises (FttP), Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has proposed following in the footsteps of international telcos such as BT and AT&T and instead deploy hundreds of thousands of nodes across the country and utilise the existing copper line — currently owned by Telstra — from the node to the premises.”

“Questions have been raised in the past about the condition of the copper network, given the age of the network, and Telstra has been reluctant to provide a full account for the state of its network. However, speaking to journalists outside a Trans Tasman Business Circle lunch in Sydney today, Thodey said that he believes the condition of the network is good.”

The anti-FTTP people are loving Thodey for it, but it seems to contradict Telstra’s own position from 2003, when at a Senate hearing they described the CAN as “five minutes to midnight”, giving it fifteen years of life – ie: until 2018, now only five years away:

“A month ago, before a Senate committee inquiry into broadband competition, Telstra’s Bill Scales and Tony Warren rather let the cat out of the bag.”

“Warren, group manager, regulatory strategy, told the committee: “I think it is right to suggest that ADSL is an interim technology. It is probably the last sweating, if you like, of the old copper network assets. In copper years, if you like, we are at a sort of transition – we are at five minutes to midnight.””

“A few minutes later his boss, Bill Scales, attempted to bury this bit of candour: “The only point of clarification, just so that there is no misunderstanding, is that when we think about the copper network, we are still thinking about 10 years out. So five minutes to midnight in this context…””

So what’s correct?

Without a full audit of the state of the network – (and nobody is going to do that) – we can’t really know.

What can we make of Thodey’s statement yesterday?

I say: “Ship of Theseus”.

Just like your grandfather’s 80-year-old axe – (it’s only had three new handles, and four new heads in that time) – of course the network could last 100 years. Or 200 years. Or 300 years.

“The ship of Theseus, also known as Theseus’s paradox, is a paradox that raises the question of whether an object which has had all its components replaced remains fundamentally the same object. The paradox is most notably recorded by Plutarch in Life of Theseus from the late 1st century. Plutarch asked whether a ship which was restored by replacing all and every of its wooden parts, remained the same ship.”

Even Thodey seemed to suggest that it will probably be “replaced”, even it if remains a copper network:

“The copper has been going well for 100 years, I think it’ll keep going for another 100, but…you’ve got to keep things maintained.”

Even if the network lasts another 100 years, it won’t be the same copper as today – that’s effectively what he is saying. If we’re going to replace it anyway, why not do it the right way – with fibre?

Word.

This NBN Or That NBN?

Generally speaking, apart from the recent asbestos incidents, things have been relatively quiet on the National Broadband Network (NBN) front of late. There have been some regulatory issues going on, but largely there hasn’t been much noise.

With the election approaching, broadband will go in one of two directions in Australia, depending on the result. The network will continue with the Conroy vision, or head down the Turnbull path.

Should the current government be returned, the existing NBN plan to rollout Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) to 93% of the population – (at speeds offered at up to 1Gbps) – will continue, with the remaining 7% of the population to receive at least 25Mbps through either LTE/4G wireless – (4%) – or Ku-band satellite (3%).

Should a change in government to the current opposition occur, we will likely see the implementation of a significantly scaled-back hybrid network, based predominantly around a Fibre-to-the-Node (FTTN) rollout.

As detailed in their detailed policy document as released on April 9th, we would see 22% of the population receiving FTTP – (presumably with the existing speed tiers) – 71% receiving FTTN – (and speeds of “at least” 25Mbps, and “up to” 100Mbps) – and the remaining 7% of the population to receiving the same solution as now, with “at least” 25Mbps through either LTE/4G wireless – (4%) – or Ku-band satellite (3%).

The 22% FTTP portion of their solution comes from the portion of the current NBN rollout they would not be able to stop, should they come to power. It is certainly not because they want to rollout FTTP.

There is no doubt that either plan would deliver a significant improvement to Australia’s current broadband capabilities. On a world scale, our broadband speeds are utterly woeful:

“The Akamai Technologies State of the Internet report, released overnight, puts Australia in 40th place for average net connection speeds, down from 39th spot in the second quarter of 2012, and beaten by five countries in the region.”

Importantly, I don’t believe there is anything intrinsically wrong with either an FTTP or an FTTN plan.

Both are entirely reasonable and elegant responses to the problems we currently face with our broadband infrastructure.

However, to see the real difference between them, we need to take a look at what each of the plans will cost us and what they will deliver for that price.

The opposition claim to be able to deliver their plan for approximately $29.4 billion of public money, whilst the existing government plan calls for approximately $34 billion.

It is these figures that shows the real difference.

The fastest speed offered on the opposition FTTN network – (ignoring the 22% FTTP they can’t get rid of) – is “up to 100Mbps”, and it will cost $29.4 billion to get there.

If you’re “lucky” enough to be in the FTTN footprint, your friend a few streets away may find themselves lucky enough to be in the FTTP footprint, and they will enjoy speeds you couldn’t get even if you wanted them – broadening the so-called “digital divide”.

People will be restricted on what speeds are available to them, based on something as simple as the street they choose to live in. The “haves” and the “have nots”.

In my experience in the telecommunications industry, the kind of broadband access available to a particular premise does affect the property value and/or the potential rental income at that property. A “financial divide” if you like.

Further, given the state of the current copper network – (which was described by Telstra in 2003 as having only about 15 years of life left in it; ie: 2018) – there is no guarantee that these speed promises can been achieved with the VDSL technology they plan to use for the “last-mile”.

As with any xDSL technology, the further away from the exchange/node/DSLAM you are, the slower speeds you achieve. When the NBN was first proposed in 2009, Optus submitted a response that required 75,224 nodes to achieve 12Mbps for 75% of the population, albeit with ADSL2+.

Any plan to bring a minimum of 25Mbps to 71% of the population with VDSL/VDSL2 will require at least that same number of nodes, and possibly more – and they still would not be able to guarantee you a particular speed.

Turnbull often cites the UK FTTN broadband model as “the right way” to do it. As shown in the above graph – (from Ofcom, the UK’s “independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries”) – if we follow that model, everyone has to be within about 500 metres of a node, and that equates to a lot of nodes.

Turnbull has said that wherever 25Mbps cannot be achieved, he’ll just add more nodes. Ask people stuck on Telstra “Top Hats” how that works out for them.

The results will wildly vary too – you might get 40Mbps, but your next door neighbour might only get 25Mbps, yet they would be charged the same.

The FTTN cabinets that contain the actual nodes are massive – want one of these on your nature strip? 75,000 lucky voters will get the chance if the FTTN plan comes to pass.

Once we need more than 100Mbps – (and the applications needing higher speeds are already upon us) – the only thing we can do is spend more money doing another upgrade, after we’ve already spent $29.4 billion.

Even Malcolm Turnbull himself agrees that we’ll have to spend more money one day:

“…now, you may say in 20 years time things will be different. Well, if they’re different in 20 years time, we’ll make some further investments in 20 years time.”

Will there be a newer copper-based technology that will allow faster speeds? Maybe, maybe not.

Is there an existing technology today that will definitely deliver higher speeds when that time comes?

Yes, and it’s called FTTP, and the existing plan is already rolling out this technology to 93% of the population for only about $4 billion more, with the significantly higher speeds we will need by the time it would be complete, with greater reliability, and with guaranteeable speeds.

The fibre technology going into the ground is already capable of 40Gbps, and leaps and bounds more upgradable than relying on the existimg, dying copper network.

Will a later upgrade from a Coalition FTTN plan to a comparable FTTP plan cost us less than $4 billion, in five or ten years from now?

No. Not on your life.

An FTTN solution also requires power to be provided to each and every node – (remember, around 75,000 of them) – in the distribution network. FTTP requires zero power in the distribution network, so will also be much cheaper to operate.

So, do we spend $29.4 billion on an FTTN solution that will be obsolete and locks us into an expensive upgrade cycle five years from now, or do we spend a little more now, to give us something that will last for 50 years or more?

You can answer that for yourself, and the philosophical differences between the two positions are at the core of the entire NBN debate.

For his part, Turnbull has often been disingenuous about his plans for the NBN:

“He told Radio 2UE earlier this month a Liberal-National government would “complete” the job, rather than rip up any cables.”

His media appearances regularly contain similar language – politically it sounds much better to say they’ll “complete” the network, rather than stop it – yet he will stop the current plan, and implement his own.

It’s not the same, and he knows it. It is a blatant lie to do nothing more than maintain a flimsy political position.

He may choose to still call it the NBN, but it is not the NBN we are building now. It is not even a shadow of what we are building now.

He and his Coalition colleagues also constantly misrepresent the cost of the FTTP plan, with a magical figure of “$90 billion or more” plucked from the air – a figure attacked in the house yesterday by parliamentary NBN committee chairman Rob Oakeshott:

“It absolutely does my head in when I hear members of parliament, who should know better, in conversations with their communities trying to spread the fib that this is a $90 billion spend or even a spend at all. This has a rate of return on investment to the taxpayer. It is an investment, not a spend. It is not a luxury item; it is an essential service for the future of this country. If we do not do it, we are going to have congestion on our internet in this country like we have never seen before. And it is going to be an enormous problem in business and in all forms of communication: health, education, personal, entertainment, whatever. Congestion is going to be our issue from 2016 and beyond.”

Faced with this attack on his FTTP cost claims, Turnbull misrepresented the cost in another way:

“The problem, however, is that because in order to reliably give everybody 100 megabits per second and more you would need to take, with current technology, fibre into every premise, the cost of taking everyone to 100 or better is enormous.”

Of course, we know his inferior solution is only to cost about $4 billion less. If his FTTN plan is so financially prudent, why does it cost 89% of the cost of what he believes is the “massive” cost of the current FTTP plan?

It’s bullshit – don’t believe it. The $90 billion figure is concocted to make it sound like his plan is $60 billion cheaper. Disingenuous to the end.

Do we want this NBN or do we want that NBN? Voters seem to know:

The existing FTTP solution allows for multiple services to be provisioned to a single premises, which is a godsend for businesses building corporate networks, and something FTTN cannot ever deliver.

For the most part, Turnbull continually ignores the importance of upload speed, which FTTP provides in spades full.

We will still be far behind the rest of the world in the broadband rankings, because by then much of the rest of the world will have completed what we have already started, but which a man with a narrow politically-based vision chose to stop. In Japan for example, Sony is already offering 2Gbps services to users for very little cost.

Why doesn’t the Coalition want Australia to lead the world?

It may just all come down to what happens on election day – Australia deserves a whole lot better than what an incoming Coalition government will serve up to us.

And that may not just be a point about broadband.

Why Are We So Shocked About PRISM?

Ever since The Guardian started revealing details of secret internet surveillance against private citizens undertaken by US government agencies – (such as the NSA) – which ultimately lead to the whistleblower Edward Snowden outing himself as their source, there has been international outcry as to the nature of these activities.

As there should be.

Many constitutions around the world have specific provisions for privacy and free speech, and such surveillance activities arguably and directly infringe against these principles.

Most of this surveillance happens without warrants, or at very least, without warrants anyone knows about.

In the United States, these warrants come from the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, under the auspices of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

Exactly how many “foreign” – (as opposed to “domestic”) – surveillance operations fall under this structure seems to be one of the biggest questions at the moment.

What really frustrates me is that people only show this level of outrage when high profile stories – (like that of Edward Snowden) – come to light, and hit the mainstream media.

It frustrates me because this kind of activity has been going on for decades. Ever heard of ECHELON?

Quoting directly from its Wikipedia entry:

“ECHELON is a name used in global media and in popular culture to describe a signals intelligence (SIGINT) collection and analysis network operated on behalf of the five signatory states to the UKUSA Security Agreement (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States, referred to by a number of abbreviations, including AUSCANNZUKUS and Five Eyes). It has also been described as the only software system which controls the download and dissemination of the intercept of commercial satellite trunk communications.”

Despite what some would argue were benign beginnings – (for the record, I don’t hold that view) – there is plenty of plausible suggestion that ECHELON has been used for purposes other than military and/or diplomatic purposes:

“Intelligence monitoring of citizens, and their communications, in the area covered by the AUSCANNZUKUS security agreement has caused concern. British journalist Duncan Campbell and New Zealand journalist Nicky Hager asserted in the 1990s that the United States was exploiting ECHELON traffic for industrial espionage, rather than military and diplomatic purposes. Examples alleged by the journalists include the gear-less wind turbine technology designed by the German firm Enercon and the speech technology developed by the Belgian firm Lernout & Hauspie. An article in the US newspaper Baltimore Sun reported in 1995 that European aerospace company Airbus lost a $6 billion contract with Saudi Arabia in 1994 after the US National Security Agency reported that Airbus officials had been bribing Saudi officials to secure the contract.”

ECHELON is apparently implemented through a network of monitoring stations throughout the world, including Australia’s Pine Gap. Of course, no official admission of the existence of ECHELON has ever been forthcoming.

Then there is the so-called “Room 641A Case”, where it is claimed that the NSA has had equipment installed to directly tap internet traffic from deep within AT&T’s network facilities:

“Room 641A is located in the SBC Communications building at 611 Folsom Street, San Francisco, three floors of which were occupied by AT&T before SBC purchased AT&T. The room was referred to in internal AT&T documents as the SG3 [Study Group 3] Secure Room. It is fed by fiber optic lines from beam splitters installed in fiber optic trunks carrying Internet backbone traffic and, as analyzed by J. Scott Marcus, a former CTO for GTE and a former adviser to the FCC, who has access to all Internet traffic that passes through the building, and therefore “the capability to enable surveillance and analysis of internet content on a massive scale, including both overseas and purely domestic traffic.” Former director of the NSA’s World Geopolitical and Military Analysis Reporting Group, William Binney, has estimated that 10 to 20 such facilities have been installed throughout the United States.”

It may in fact be these 10 to 20 “641A-type” facilities that Edward Snowden indirectly speaks of as the enablers of the PRISM surveillance system he has lifted the lid upon.

These facilities appear to have been in place since at least 2003.

Similar activities have been underway since the height of the Cold War, including the snooping of undersea communications systems:

“One of the most successful of these missions, code-named Ivy Bells, was the tapping of a vital Soviet undersea communications cable. The mission was carried out by USS HALIBUT, which crept into the Sea of Okhotsk, the bay separating the Kamchatka Peninsula from the Soviet mainland. Divers descended to the sea floor 400 feet below the surface to install a recording pod.”

The intelligence community has had the will and the means to conduct this kind of surveillance for many years. As communications technology has evolved, so to have their snooping methods.

People would probably be most naive to think that snooping on private citizens with these systems is a new phenomenon.

In Australia, the Greens are already seeking to enact legislation to eliminate warrantless use of these systems on Australian citizens.

We shouldn’t be so shocked about PRISM, just because it makes good news copy at the moment – it’s been happening for years.

It’s all well and good to be shocked about PRISM; if you are, be more shocked at just how long this has been going on for. We are right to be outraged right now – but we should maintain that rage.

Pressure our politicians.

Particularly when this all disappears from the front pages of our newspapers in coming weeks – because it will, yet it will all still be happening.

The evolving news cycle won’t change it – at all.

Asbestos: Lets Just Fix It

Shall we be honest here for a moment?

There’s been a lot of heat in the last week over the issue of asbestos lining in thousands of telecommunications pits around Australia, being remediated as part of the National Broadband Network (NBN) rollout.

Certainly, it would seem that a number of Telstra sub-contractors – (and probably more accurately, only a few work crews working under those sub-contractors) – have grossly mishandled the deadly material as part of the works in a number of areas around the country.

For this, they should be condemned – the carcinogenic nature of asbestos is well known, and in this day and age there should be no complacency with regards to how it should be dealt with.

Telstra is contracted to remediate all pits and ducts on behalf of NBN Co, in preparation for their contractors to actually roll the NBN fibre.

Which is why all the finger pointing at NBN Co is so badly misplaced.

This is a Telstra responsibility, and that’s what people – (and in particular, many of our politicians) – need to start being honest about.

The Government has been well aware of the issue for some time, and asked Telstra to act on this issue in 2009, at about the time the NBN planning was being finalised, and about the time – (presumably) – that the asbestos issue was identified as a risk to the project:

“Workplace Relations Minister Bill Shorten revealed on Monday he asked Telstra in 2009 to act on the danger that asbestos-lined underground boxes used for the network could pose a health hazard to workers and residents.”

In recent days, it has been clearly identified that Telstra is the responsible authority in this regard:

“Federal workplace safety agency Comcare admitted on Monday the system had failed to stop a breakdown in communication between Telstra executives and subcontractors handling the deadly fibres at thousands of sites.”

To their credit, Telstra seems prepared to take responsibility for the issue. Given they are contractually obliged to do so, this seems a fairly straightforward position for them to take. Steps are already underway to make good on the issue.

Telstra’s governance of their project to conduct the remediation activities seems to be at fault here.

Of course, the opposition has been firmly on a front-foot attack posture over the issue, claiming another failure in the league of the “pink batts” project.

Given that it was apparent that NBN Co identified the risk and that they sought to remediate the issue via Telstra, exactly how anyone can suggest the government and NBN Co didn’t take the issue seriously is something of a mystery.

Unless of course it is a politically motivated position? Surely not?

(PREVIOUS COMMENT MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF SARCASM)

Significantly, the current opposition knew about the asbestos issue in telecommunications pits for at least six years during their last period in government before they lost the 2007 election. Interestingly, it was current opposition leader Tony Abbott who appears to have ignored the problem in 2001:

“Telstra tried to fast-track compensation arrangements for its employees exposed to asbestos but was rebuffed by Tony Abbott’s own department back in 2001.”

“With the opposition on Monday leading a parliamentary attack on the government over its alleged lack of urgency in addressing asbestos discovered in Telstra junction pits being handed over to the NBN, Fairfax Media has learnt the giant telco wanted to create an independent body to accelerate compensation and sought approval from the Department of Workplace Relations.”

“However, the department, then under the ministerial leadership of Mr Abbott, rejected the plan.”

The thing that irks me the most is that the Coalition seems to have stuck their head in the ground – (no pun intended) – on the issue, with Malcolm Turnbull seemingly happy to leave most of the asbestos in the ground, even when his version of the NBN is potentially rolled out:

“Because we will simply bring fibre out to the distribution point, the street cabinet, all of the conduits and pits beyond that – the ones outside people’s houses for example – will not be disturbed at all.”

Under his plan, most of the asbestos lined pits in your street, in front of your house, or even in your garden, are going to be left there.

Would you be happy with that?

The current FTTP NBN plan not only provides for Australia’s telecommunications needs well into the future – (and with a far longer lifespan than the current alternative FTTN plan) – it also gives us the opportunity to fix the problem of asbestos in our streets, once and for all.

Despite their bluff and bluster about the dangers of asbestos, they are proposing to just leave it in the ground – for someone else to fix another day.

Their plans to kill the current NBN look more irresponsible as time goes by, and we deserve so much better than that.

This is a chance to fix it, and to fix it now.