Australia’s silence on the attribution of cyberattacks and intellectual property theft emanating from China is representative of a broader silence on irritants and fundamental differences in the bilateral relationship. This silence does not serve Australia’s …
Governments rarely monitor and evaluate their diplomatic outcomes and study lessons learned. That’s strange given the extent to which they evaluate and scrutinise foreign aid spending, defence acquisitions and intelligence-collection efforts. Because so much of …
Open-source intelligence (OSINT) has long been undervalued; elbowed out by sexier-sounding ‘secret intelligence’, it has also often been overlooked. But what is intelligence? For the answer, let’s go straight to the wisdom of the Middle …
Last week, Greg Austin wrote in The Strategist that ‘those in Australia advocating for a ban on Huawei in the 5G network—mimicking the opinion of US intelligence chiefs expressed in February 2018—have not reviewed all …
Last week, Australian Signals Directorate Director-General Mike Burgess gave an on-the-record speech to ASPI’s artificial intelligence and national security masterclass. Following his speech, he took some tough questions from the media and the audience. Public …
The Australian government will soon announce its decision on whether to allow Huawei to participate in Australia’s 5G network. It’s one of the most important policy decisions the prime minister will make this year. And it’s …
Facebook is king in Papua New Guinea (PNG) but its reign may soon be over. This week Communications Minister Sam Basil, a regular Facebook user himself, announced that PNG would shut down the social media site for …
Australia is in the midst of a much-needed cyber resuscitation. Over the past two years Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, a small group of overworked public servants, proactive industry supporters and key civil society actors have …
The Australian Defence Department has banned staff and serving personnel from downloading the Chinese social media and messaging app WeChat onto their work phones. ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre staff sat down today to discuss …
Each month we learn more and more about the extent of Russia’s interference in the 2016 US elections. Fraudulent social media accounts accused of propping up non-existent political commentators, armies of Twitter bots designed to …
It’s been nearly two months since China’s official media agency Xinhua debuted #Xiplomacy on Twitter. Xinhua, with a weighty 11 million Twitter followers, initially used the hashtag to push out a new multipart documentary series …
A fortnight ago, while most Australians were safely tucked into bed, America’s Twitter-happy president took to his favourite platform to tap out another policy announcement. You never know what you’re going to get from @realDonaldTrump, …
