Articles by: "Fergus Hanson"
Introducing integrated e-government in Australia

During the initial wave of digital-transformation efforts, Australia developed an international reputation as an early leader. That peaked in around 1999. While the different tiers of government (local, state and federal) and individual agencies have …

What’s the big deal about digital identity?

Unless you’re an avid reader of federal budget statements, you probably missed the $92.4 million allocation in the 2018–19 Budget to build a digital identity scheme known as GovPass—the second one that taxpayers will now …

Hacking for ca$h

In 2015 then-US President Barack Obama metaphorically arm-wrestled Chinese President Xi Jinping into agreeing to stop engaging in commercial cyber espionage. Since then, China has made a similar pact with G20 members and made bilateral …

Are we being played in the Pacific?

If you were trying to design a low-cost strategy to constrict the operational horizon of an important US ally in the region, China’s ploys in the Pacific wouldn’t be a bad model to examine. China …

Encryption bill faces uphill battle

After a few false starts, the government has released its promised legislation to address the ‘going dark’ problem caused by encryption—something that affects more than 90% of the data lawfully intercepted by the Australian Federal …

The art of the backflip

  Donald J. Trump‏Verified account @realDonaldTrump May 13 President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast. Too many jobs in China …

Naming and shaming the unshameable

Imagine the scene: you run a large multinational company and you’ve just had US$300 million stolen from your bank account. A few months down the track the government steps in and, to much fanfare, names the …

Does the emperor have clothes?

Nick Bryant went close to saying, ‘The emperor has no clothes!’ in his recent Lowy Interpreter article on rethinking of the value proposition of e-diplomacy. Appropriately, the post came to me via my Twitter feed …