Strengths and weaknesses

Last week, the government announced the creation of a new defence department unit to combat hackers.

In an article published overnight, Peter Hartcher pointed out that this is in response to our country’s pretty awful state of preparation for cyber attacks. “Only good luck has protected Australia to date,” he wrote.

Also last week, Primrose Riordan reported that “Most government agencies are not fully compliant with required cybersecurity controls, which the audit office has warned reduces their ability to deter serious hacks.”

So it probably shouldn’t come as a massive shock that, according to Paul Farrell at the Guardian, any Australian’s Medicare details can be bought on the “dark web”.

What should shock you slightly, though, is that, first, the government didn’t seem to know this. Second, the minister’s response suggests either obtuse deflection or flat-out naivety. The information, Alan Tudge said, “was not sufficient to access any personal health record”. Not relevant, minister. As Farrell pointed out, “the primary concern about the disclosure of Medicare card details is their value to organised crime groups because they allow them to produce fake physical Medicare cards with legitimate information that can then be used for identification fraud. These cards have been used by drug syndicates to buy goods and lease or buy property or cars.”

This is pretty worrying stuff.

Cyber security is not generally seen as a top-order political issue, and I understand why – it’s complicated and there’s a sense (an accurate one) that it’s something all countries are struggling with.

But there’s also the possibility it could creep into the competence space for this government, a development that could be deadly. After all, the Census debacle led to more headlines than pretty much anything this government has intentionally done.

All this gets a little more worrying when you remember that one of the things Malcolm Turnbull is supposed to be doing with his eight days overseas [$] is working with other leaders to get access to encrypted messaging, for the purposes of combating terrorism.

(It could be an interesting trip. Turnbull is also going to have to manage the optics of meeting the Queen – surely he frontfoots the republic – and meeting Donald Trump again, without relapsing into either brownnosing or comic impersonation.)

I suspect that most Australians would be fairly happy with the government doing whatever is necessary to prevent terror attacks. But I also suspect that, if this is going to involve trespasses on their privacy, they would like it done by a government that has demonstrated competence in the area.

It would be remiss of me not to remind you that it was only a couple of months ago that the Federal Police, finally given access to metadata with supposedly strict restraints in place, managed to stuff that up.

And don’t forget that our prime minister is an alleged tech head. All of this is happening in an area that is supposed to be one of his strengths.

Unfortunately for the government, it seems determined to pick fights in its areas of weakness, too. I have a growing suspicion that Turnbull is unwittingly sliding into an industrial relations battle at precisely the wrong time. (Bernard Keane is excellent on this today [$].) Bill Shorten is doing everything he can to make penalty rates a totemic issue, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he succeeds.

At a time when uncertainty in both the economy and the workforce are very high, the government made an announcement about “internships” for unemployed young people wanting to work in retail. This is old politics: get those bludgers into work. But people aren’t dills. As the policy director of Interns Australia said, “My first job was at Bakers Delight. I didn’t need to do unpaid work experience for 12 weeks to learn how to do it. Nobody needs to. After a short period, you are performing productive work and deserve to be paid for it as an employee.” The sniff test says no. And as Keane points out, the program is likely to undercut wages, as businesses get handed workers for free. The government seems to have forgotten the environment in which it’s now operating. People want work, but they also want wages, and security, and they see the need for those things in other people’s lives, too.

These are all minor issues, but they have the potential to grow. The government needs to work better, especially given that the only vague glimmer of polling light recently – the Essential poll – has faded out today, showing the government has not in fact moved an inch.

Oddly enough, Turnbull himself has seemed more comfortable in recent days. Perhaps it’s the end of parliament; perhaps it’s the thought of getting the hell out of this country for a week.

In other news

• Julia Gillard has told Lateline about her own experiences of anxiety.
• Ugly Australian social media attitudes to an African disaster.
• Rebecca Huntley on the Essential poll, and Abbott’s flaws. A Nationals senator loads up on Abbott and Pyne. Peta Credlin not hot on Turnbull, everyone is surprised.
• The head of the Australian Border Force is on leave as a matter is considered.
• Sport: The female AFL commentators shaking up the game.
• Culture: The problem with Didion-isation of blurbs. (Includes the sentence “What happens often is not often what should happen often.”)
• Media: Fake news is becoming a problem on the American left, too.
• UK: Unsurprisingly, given his election result, Jeremy Corbyn continues to improve in polls.
• US legal system: A long-time US Supreme Court correspondent retires. And if that’s the sort of thing you like: the new Supreme Court justice is making his mark already. Bonus: A good Chris Christie tweet.