As Predicted, Australian Government Looks To Creep Site Censorship Into Search Censorship

from the creep-creep-creep dept

Earlier this year, we discussed Australia's Department of Communications asking for feedback on the effectiveness of its site-blocking policy after it had been in place for several years. The copyright industries both local and foreign leapt at the chance, making two divergent claims. Claim one: site-blocking is working really, really well and should be continued. Claim two: site-blocking is being vastly undermined by, you guessed it, Google, and the government should extend site-blocking into search-blocking as a result. We made the point at the time that this type of thing occurs like clockwork: you open the door to some censorship and those cheering it on will attempt to expand it further.

Well, after collecting its feedback, the Australian Department of Communications has come out with proposed amendments to Australian copyright law that would, you guessed it again, force search engines to censor links to so-called "pirate sites."

The aims of the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill 2018 are fairly straightforward.

Where existing legislation compels ISPs to prevent access to sites listed in an injunction, the amendments attempt to deal with sites that “have started to provide access to the online location after the injunction is made”, meaning that subsequently appearing mirrors and proxies can be dealt with much more quickly.

Turning to the perceived problems with search engines, the amendments will allow rightsholders to apply for injunctions that will not only target infringing ‘online locations’ but also their appearance in search results.

Again, this is plainly stupid. Search engines have one goal if they want to be successful: return the most relevant search results to a user's query. That's it. The problem in all of this is that the Australian public searches for infringing content. For a company like Google to kneecap its own usefulness in this manner makes no sense and, again, opens the door to force search engines to behave in all kinds of ways that governments may desire. And, yes, that's a slippery slope argument, except we're already inching down this particular slippery slope, making it a question of just how far down Australia will slide.

And, because of course, the requirements placed on search companies are both vague and onerous.

Companies including Google will be required to “take such steps as the Court considers reasonable so as not to provide a search result that refers users to the online location.” Search providers will also be compelled to deal with the subsequent appearance of mirrors and proxies by ensuring that these don’t appear in search results either.

In a statement published this morning, the Department of Communications offered the following summary.

“The Copyright Amendment Bill will ensure a broader range of overseas websites and file-hosting services widely used for sharing music and movies are within the scope of the scheme, and provide a means for proxy and mirror pirate sites to be blocked quickly,” the statement reads.

Let's be clear about what this is. This new legislation is a national government requiring a useful internet tool to be less useful to the average Australian citizen that is searching the internet, simply as a favor to a few big content players in both Australia and, what will be more common, abroad. That's a clear disservice by the Australian government to its own people.

Filed Under: australia, copyright, search, site blocking

Broad Alliance Calls For Australian Government To Listen To Experts' Warnings About Flaws In New Compelled Access Legislation

from the nah,-we're-ramming-it-through-anyway dept

The battle against encryption is being waged around the world by numerous governments, no matter how often experts explain, often quite slowly, that it's a really bad idea. As Techdirt reported back in August, Australia is mounting its own attack against privacy and security in the form of a compelled access law. The pushback there has just taken an interesting turn with the formation of a Alliance for a Safe and Secure Internet:

The Alliance is campaigning for the Government to slow down, stop ignoring the concerns of technology experts, and listen to its citizens when they raise legitimate concerns. For a piece of legislation that could have such far ranging impacts, a proper and transparent dialogue is needed, and care taken to ensure it does not have the unintended consequence of making all Australians less safe.

The Alliance for a Safe and Secure Internet represents an unusually wide range of interests. It includes Amnesty International and the well-known local group Digital Rights Watch, the Communications Alliance, the main industry body for Australian telecoms, and DIGI, which counts Facebook, Google, Twitter and Yahoo among its members. One disturbing development since we last wrote about the proposed law is the following:

The draft Bill was made public in mid-August and, following a three week consultation process, a large number of submissions from concerned citizens and organisation were received by the Department of Home Affairs. Only a week after the consultation closed the Bill was rushed into Parliament with only very minor amendments, meaning that almost all the expert recommendations for changes to the Bill were ignored by Government.

…

The Bill has now been referred to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security (PJCIS), where again processes have been truncated, setting the stage for it to be passed into law within months.

That's a clear indication that the Australian government intends to ram this law through the legislative process as quickly as possible, and that it has little intention of taking any notice of what the experts say on the matter -- yet again.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+

Filed Under: australia, backdoors, compelled access, encryption, security

Australian Gov't Likes Intrusive Border Device Searches Just As Much As The US Does

from the privacy-continues-to-be-the-biggest-victim-of-terrorist-attacks dept

Australians will be thrilled to discover they won't have to visit the United States to have their electronic devices brutalized and mercilessly probed in the name of security. Why spend all that money flying halfway around the world when you can experience the same intrusive discomfort at home?

A British-Australian citizen travelling through Sydney airport has had his devices seized, and believes his laptop password cracked and his digital files inspected by Border Force officers, in what privacy groups say is a worrying development.

Nathan Hague, a 46-year-old software developer, was detained apparently at random for 90 minutes while the officers took his phone and password-protected laptop into a back room.

Hague had no reason to be treated with extra suspicion, but extra suspicion was there all the same, simply because the random selection process told border officers to be as intrusive as possible. He asked officers a reasonable question -- if you search my other belongings in public because I'm a randomly selected "threat," why can't you search my devices out in the open. There was, of course, no response.

Other questions about the Border Force's handling of the contents of Hague's devices also went unanswered. Officers refused to say whether data would be copied and/or retained, as well as refusing to explain what they were looking for.

Why did the Border Force perform this intrusive search? Because it can.

“Officers may question travellers and examine goods if they suspect the person may be of interest for immigration, customs, biosecurity, health, law-enforcement or national security reasons,” said a spokesperson for the ABF.

So, for any reason or no reason, so long as the word "security" is chanted during the proceedings. Who could limit the Border Force's intrusive, suspicionless searches? Only the people who've already decided they're not going to.

Under the Customs Act, officers have the right to examine travellers’ personal items, including accessing electronic devices and making copies of their files. The Customs Act imposes no legal threshold or requirement that officers need to meet in order to use this power

The Border Force offered quasi-reasons in defense of its handling of Hague and his devices. The law itself doesn't even compel a quasi-rationalization.

And the law might get worse. Proposed changes would give citizens with password-protected devices two choices: hand over the password or spend 5-10 years in prison. At this point, Hague was free to refuse the request, but that likely would have meant not seeing those devices again for weeks or months. The Border Force has extended an invitation to the software developer to file a complaint with its redress black hole, just in case Hague wants to spend more time being jerked around by the Australian government.

This is status quo in the so-called free world: suspicionless, highly-intrusive searches requiring minimal, if any, justification… all done in the name of national security. While citizens may realize a security/freedom tradeoff is necessary in some extreme cases, their governments have already determined the exchange rate and made it clear the freedom side will continue to lose value indefinitely.

Filed Under: australia, border search, confiscated, devices, laptops, nathan hague, phones, privacy, random search, surveillance

Australian Gov't Floats New Batch Of Compelled Access Legislation With An Eye On Encryption

from the hello-darkness-my-old-friend dept

The Australian government is looking to revamp its compelled access laws to fight encryption and other assorted technological advances apparently only capable of being used for evil. It's getting pretty damn dark Down Under, according to the Department of Home Affairs' announcement of the pending legislation.

Encryption conceals the content of communications and data held on devices, as well as the identity of users. Secure, encrypted communications are increasingly being used by terrorist groups and organised criminals to avoid detection and disruption. The problem is widespread, for example:

• Encryption impacts at least nine out of every ten of ASIO’s priority cases.

• Over 90 per cent of data being lawfully intercepted by the AFP now use some form of encryption.

• Effectively all communications among terrorists and organised crime groups are expected to be encrypted by 2020.

An example of harmful encryption is provided for readers at home, so they can weigh their own security and privacy against an anecdote about a registered sex offender who may or may not have escaped prosecution (the outcome of the case isn't provided) by using encrypted messaging apps. And it includes an inadvertently helpful lesson about the stupidity of targeting encryption with legislation, even if the DHA likely doesn't realize it.

The suspect was arrested and his mobile phone was seized but despite legislative requirements he refused to provide his passcode.

There's the limitation of lawmaking. Lawbreakers break laws and they're not going to stop just because you've told them not to with a government mandate. Legislation [PDF] like this does little more than make life more difficult for service providers and device makers while undermining the privacy and security of millions of law-abiding citizens.

The explanation sheet [PDF] notes the government is not seeking to mandate encryption backdoors. That being said, it would like providers of encrypted services/devices to leave the door cracked open so the government can step inside whenever it feels the need to look around.

The type of assistance that may be requested or required under the above powers include (amongst other things):

• Removing a form of electronic protection applied by the provider, if the provider has an existing capability to remove this protection.

• Providing technical information like the design specifications of a device or the characteristics of a service.

• Installing, maintaining, testing or using software or equipment given to a provider by an agency.

• Formatting information obtained under a warrant.

• Facilitating access to devices or services.

• Helping agencies test or develop their own systems and capabilities.

• Notifying agencies of major changes to their systems, productions or services that are relevant to the effective execution of a warrant or authorisation.

• Modifying or substituting a target service.

• Concealing the fact that agencies have undertaken a covert operation.

The law can't retroactively force companies to produce crackable devices and messaging systems. But the first bullet point could see the Australian government demanding they do so in the future if they want to provide goods and services to the Australian public. Fortunately, the bill includes a clause making future demands along these lines impossible for the time being.

The Bill expressly prohibits technical assistance notices or technical capability notices from requiring a provider to build or implement a systemic weakness or systemic vulnerability into a form of electronic protection. This includes systemic weaknesses that would render methods of authentication or encryption less effective. The Australian Government has no interest in undermining systems that protect the fundamental security of communications. The new powers will have no effect to the extent that requirements would reasonably make electronic services, devices or software vulnerable to interference by malicious actors. Importantly, a technical capability notice cannot require a provider to build a capability to remove electronic protection and puts beyond doubt that these notices cannot require the construction of decryption capabilities.

Without further discussion by the legislature, it's tough to tell whether creating an escrow system would be considered a "system weakness" or make "encryption less effective." I mean, it obviously is and does, but does the DHA see it that way? And will this clause survive the final markup? Compelling decryption using "existing" methods seems especially useless if most services and devices cannot currently be decrypted by providers. The government is better off seeking outside help from contractors who do nothing else but find ways to crack or bypass encryption, rather than dropping language into the law that suggests backdoors the government won't call "backdoors" will be mandated in the future.

It also gives the government a considerable expansion of power, allowing it to peruse private companies' design specs and a heads up if any redesigns are in the works. It also forces companies to be compliant partners in government surveillance by mandating their assistance in man-in-the-middle attacks ("modifying or substituting a target service") and ordering them to withhold information from affected customers.

There is a public comment period, which is a nice touch. There also appears to be some respect for the good encryption does, rather than simply viewing it as an escape route for criminals and terrorists. But there's also a good deal of power expansion tied to rickety wording that suggests backdoors might be mandated if the government can talk itself into viewing proposals as something other than backdoors. And there's no guarantee this vague promise will make the final cut.

Filed Under: australia, backdoors, encryption, going dark, law enforcement, surveillance

The War On Fan-Subtitles Comes To Australia in The Form Of Site-Blocking

from the block-party dept

One of the more curious fronts in the never ending copyright wars is the one launched against fan-made subtitles. The theory from the entertainment industry goes something like this: these subtitles allow pirates to download movies in foreign countries and then apply the subtitles to view them coherently, therefore it's all copyright infringement. It's a dumb argument on many levels, but chiefly because it's inescapably true that the entertainment industry has done an absolutely terrible job of making sure it releases its own subtitled movies in these same countries and in these same languages. In other words, the entertainment industry isn't going to serve you foreigners, and we're not going to let anyone else serve you either. To date, much of this front of the war has been fought in Europe.

But now it's poised to make landfall in Australia, where a site-blocking request lobbed by a group of entertainment industry players has, for the first time, included fansub sites.

Together the companies filed an application for the broadest-ever blocking injunctionat the Federal Court in Australia. If successful, it would compel Australia’s ISPs to block a record-setting 151 domains related to 77 ‘pirate’ sites.

The list of ISPs in the case is familiar. Telstra, Optus, Vocus, TPG and their subsidiaries are all named as respondents in the case with the addition of Vodafone, which was added after recently entering the fixed-line broadband market.  What is notable about the list is the inclusion, for the first time, of sites such as Subscene, Subsmovies, YIFYSubtitles. As their names suggest, these platforms offer subtitles for the latest movies and TV shows, something that doesn’t sit well with any of the companies involved but particularly Madman Entertainment which specializes in Japanese anime.

Let's be clear about what this represents. The entertainment industry wants entire websites blocked for helping viewers understand what is being said on in their own native languages. If that doesn't smack of overreach, it's hard to imagine what would. This isn't to say that fansubs can't be used in combination with pirated movies and shows. They sure as hell can, but that isn't the only application. The other is that entertainment fans buy the products legitimately, rip them, and then apply the fansubs so they can enjoy what they bought. The fact that such a market even exists makes the obvious point that the entertainment industry is failing at giving customers what they want or, in this case, need in order to enjoy those products. And yet the end result here is bans on entire sites?

Fortunately, the judge overseeing all of this appears to be fairly sober on how big a shift this represents for site-blocking.

As a result, the ever precise Justice Nicholas told the parties to ensure that no stone is left unturned in preparing evidence for the Court.

“You better make sure your evidence in relation to that is particularly thorough,” the Judge said. “There’s some creep here occurring – I don’t say that critically… [but] it’s a new angle so I’ll need to look at that closely.”

That sure sounds like a judge telling the industry that it sure better have the goods if it expects the court to go along with any of this. That isn't to say Nicholas can't be convinced with a sub-par response to his request. Perhaps he will be. But from the outset it's good to see Nicholas realize the importance of this shift and the industry's creep into areas of site-blocking.

In the end, as is always the case, the bigger point is that attacking fansub sites is dumb. All the recent evidence seems to show that good legal alternatives are the recipe for stamping out concerns over piracy. Site-blocking those actually providing those alternatives, on the other hand, is not.

Filed Under: australia, censorship, copyright, fan subs, site blocking, subtitles

How A US Burger Chain Brought 'Ruby Tuesday' Full Circle Through Trademark Bullying

from the the-circle-is-now-complete dept

Circles are so zen. So jedi. So the force. "The circle is now complete," Darth Vader says in A New Hope. Well, it turns out that the universe has a way of pulling this sort of dynamic out of the realm of the mystical and into the far more mundane realm of trademark bullying. You may be aware of the American burger chain Ruby Tuesday. The chain has locations all over the United States and internationally. Notably, the company's website lists no locations in Australia. This is notable because the American chain has for some reason decided to try to bully an Australian rock band, Ruby Tuesdays, into changing its name over trademark concerns.

Ruby Tuesday the restaurant has served Ruby Tuesdays the band with a letter outlining their intent to sue. It reads: “While many artists pay tribute to other artists through imitation, when it comes to imitating famous trademarks, only Ruby Tuesday is entitled to the goodwill of its mark.”

The letter continues: “In fact, the knowing adoption of a mark intending to play off a well-established mark is among the most egregious of trademark violations, warranting courts to apply the harshest of consequences.”

The corporation has demanded that the group change its name, close down its website, destroy all of its merch and pass on all of its profits as compensation.

So, a number of things should be immediately obvious here. First, these two organizations are not remotely in the same marketplace. Burgers and music acts offer no avenue for public confusion as to what the source of the prodct is. Second, for that and a myriad of other reasons, there is no potential for confusion here. The entire point of trademark law is to keep consumers informed as to the source and affiliations of a product. That is simply not in issue here. All of that is particularly so when you consider that Ruby Tuesday does not have any storefront locations in the entire country in which the band exists. We can just add here for context that this is a penniless hobby band that has very little notoriety, even in Australia.

But back to the concept of this representing a circle. Our younger readers may not realize this, but the Ruby Tuesday restaurant chain has an ironic source for its name.

The restaurant's name was derived from The Rolling Stones song, "Ruby Tuesday", which was popular during the time of the first restaurant's inception. The name was suggested to founder Sandy Beall by Bob Hope.

"The circle is now complete." Yes, the restaurant yoinked the title of one of the most popular songs from one of the most popular rock bands ever for its name in the 1960s and then turned around and attempted to bully a little-known rock band out of that same name in the present. I'll give Ruby Tuesday credit here for the pure audacious irony of its tone-deaf attempt at legal asshatery.

Zero credit is awarded, however, for having anything resembling a valid trademark claim.

Filed Under: australia, hamburgers, music, restaurants, ruby tuesday, trademark, us
Companies: ruby tuesday

More Taco Tuesday Trademark Stupidity, This Time Down Under

from the trademark-tuesday dept

Some of us believe that all the different nations of the world are filled with people that are mostly the same, that share the same values, and the same troubles. If only we could find some unifying issue or force that could fully bring us together, then we could finally live in a kind of Lennon-esque harmony with one another. I submit to you that perhaps stupid trademark stories revolving around "Taco Tuesdays" could well be that thing. In America, for instance, a chain called Taco John's has spent the past few years waving around the trademark the USPTO stupidly gave it on the both generic and descriptive term "Taco Tuesdays", insisting that every other business that uses it stop immediately. How this mark was ever granted, given that it describes a good offered on the day it is offered -- tacos on a tuesday -- is a question that has kept me up many a night. Despite the trouble Taco John's has caused with this, the trademark remains registered and in place.

And now it appears that Australia has its own version of this, featuring another company waving around another trademark for "Taco Tuesdays" that never should have been granted.

A stone’s throw into the city’s wild west sits Footscray’s Reverence Hotel, famed for its live music and cheap Tuesday tacos. After six years of dishing up the spicy fare, the landmark corner hotel is suddenly feeling the heat over a claim that it is infringing a trademark held by Mexican food chain Salsas Fresh Mex, which has outlets dotted across Melbourne including a site at Highpoint shopping centre. A letter from Salsas Holdings marketing manager Rebecca Woods to The Reverence Hotel demanded it stop using the phrase ”Taco Tuesday” on its website and social media accounts.

“We assume that you are unaware that Salsas is the owner of the registered trade mark TACO TUESDAY in respect to the provision of Mexican-style food and restaurant services,” it states. “The Mexican-style food offered by Salsas under that trademark has become extremely well and favourably known among members of the public in Australia, and as a result is associated with Salsas.”

I'm going to keep hammering on this until someone listens, because this trademark is not valid. Period. Paragraph. Full stop. It does not identify a source. The phrase itself is generic and common in both the restaurant industry the world over and even in homes around the world. Tuesday is for tacos and nothing about the phrase has anything to do with any individual person or business.

The folks at Footscray's had this same reaction in the most punk venue way possible.

Publican Matt Bodiam said his first reaction on opening the letter on Wednesday was amusement, but he soon realised the potential seriousness.

“I had a bit of a giggle, then [thought] I better look into it,” he said. “I can’t believe someone can trademark ‘Taco Tuesday’; it would be like trademarking ‘Happy Hour’ or ‘Tight-Arse Tuesday’, although perhaps someone has trademarked those as well.”

Actually, the "happy hour" reference is only half right. In that phrase, we have an example of the generic language tons of businesses use. Taco Tuesdays is the same in that respect, except it's also descriptive. This isn't the protection of the consuming public, the very point of trademark law, but rather the locking up of language for commercial purposes. And it's dumb.

But it also works. Salsas has enough of a legal warchest to make Footscray's fighting the good fight on this an absurd notion. It is far easier and less expensive to simply cow to the demands of the trademark bully than putting up a fight in court. Trademark bullying, in other words, works. But perhaps not without giving creative punk venue owners the last laugh.

Mr Bodiam said The Reverence would continue selling tacos on Tuesdays, but the night is now listed on its site as “Taco Sueday”.

Bravo, sir.

Filed Under: australia, matt bodiam, taco sueday, taco tuesday, trademark

Open Source Industry Australia Says Zombie TPP Could Destroy Free Software Licensing

from the another-reason-not-to-ratify dept

It seems incredible, but the TPP trade deal is still staggering on, zombie-like. It's official name is now the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), but even the Australian government just calls it TPP-11. The "11" refers to the fact that TPP originally involved 12 nations, but the US pulled out after Donald Trump's election. The Australian Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence & Trade is currently conducting an inquiry into TPP-11 as a step towards ratification by Australia. However, in its submission to the committee (pdf), Open Source Industry Australia (OSIA) warns that provisions in TPP-11's Electronic Commerce Chapter "have the potential to destroy the Australian free & open source software (FOSS) sector altogether", and calls on the Australian government not to ratify the deal. The problem lies in Article 14.17 of the TPP-11 text (pdf):

No Party shall require the transfer of, or access to, source code of software owned by a person of another Party, as a condition for the import, distribution, sale or use of such software, or of products containing such software, in its territory.

In its submission to the committee, the OSIA writes:

Article 14.17 of CPTPP prohibits requirements for transfer or access to the source code of computer software. Whilst it does contain some exceptions, those are very narrow and appear rather carelessly worded in places. The exception that has OSIA up in arms covers "the inclusion of terms and conditions related to the provision of source code in commercially negotiated contracts". If Australia ratifies CPTPP, much will turn on whether the Courts interpret the term "commercially negotiated contracts" as including FOSS licences all the time, some of the time or none of the time.

If the Australian courts rule that open source licenses are not "commercially negotiated contracts", those licences will no longer be enforceable in Australia, and free software as we know it will probably no longer exist there. Even if the courts rule that free software licenses are indeed "commercially negotiated contracts", there is another problem, the OSIA says:

The wording of Art. 14.17 makes it unclear whether authors could still seek injunctions to enforce compliance with licence terms requiring transfer of source code in cases where their copyright has been infringed.

Without the ability to enforce compliance through the use of injunctions, open source licenses would once again be pointless. Although the OSIA is concerned about free software in Australia, the same logic would apply to any TPP-11 country. It would also impact other nations that joined the Pacific pact later, as the UK is considering (the UK government seems not to have heard of the gravity theory for trade). It would presumably apply to the US if it did indeed rejoin the pact, as has been mooted. In other words, the impact of this section on open source globally could be significant.

It's worth remembering why this particular article is present in TPP. It grew out of concerns that nations like China and Russia were demanding access to source code as a pre-requisite of allowing Western software companies to operate in their countries. Article 14.17 was designed as a bulwark against such demands. It's unlikely that it was intended to destroy open source licensing too, although some spotted early on that this was a risk. And doubtless a few big software companies will be only too happy to see free software undermined in this way. Unfortunately, it's probably too much to hope that the Australian Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence & Trade will care about or even understand this subtle software licensing issue. The fate of free software in Australia will therefore depend on whether TPP-11 comes into force, and if so, what judges think Article 14.17 means.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+

Filed Under: australia, copyright, cptpp, open source, source code, tpp

Australian Cops Say Their Unreliable Drug Dogs Will Decide Who Gets To Attend Music Festivals

from the 4/5ths-wrong,-1/5-creeping-authoritarianism dept

The New South Wales Police think they've figured out this whole drugs-and-music thing. To slow the entry of drugs (and drug users) to events where drugs (and drug users) might be found, they're going to station their most unreliable officers at the entrance and have them point out the people who should be forbidden from entering. From the NSW Police Facebook post:

Police are warning patrons attending the ‘Above and Beyond’ music festival at Sydney this weekend that drug detection dogs will be at the venue.

The event will run from 6pm until midnight on Saturday (9 June 2018), at the Sydney Showground.

Police warn that drug detection dogs will patrol the venue and can detect the presence of prohibited drugs or someone who has recently had drugs on them. If a dog makes an indication you will be denied entry.

[...]

Police will exclude any person from the venue that the drug dog indicates has or who has recently had drugs on them, regardless of whether drugs are located.

This is great news for all those pro-Drug War types who think the innocent are just as guilty as the guilty until proven otherwise. Drug dogs are much better at detecting handler cues than detecting drugs, so it's inevitable this deployment of K-9 units will result in paying customers being screwed out of their money by four-legged animals.

Drug dogs have outrageous failure rates, considering law enforcement (and some courts) hold them up to be "probable cause on four legs." It's quite possibly even worse in Australia.

Last year, of the 15,779 searches conducted after police-dog identification, no drugs were found in 11,694 cases. Drugs were found in 4085 cases, resulting in a ''false positive'' rate of 74 per cent, said the Greens MP David Shoebridge, who obtained the figures

Those stats are from 2010. There's every reason to believe accuracy has improv...

A record 80 per cent of sniffer dog searches for drugs resulted in ''false positives'' this year, figures show.

The figures obtained from the state government in response to parliamentary questions on notice show 14,102 searches were conducted after a dog sat next to a person, indicating they might be carrying drugs. But, in 11,248 cases, no drugs were found.

So, there's an 80% chance festival goers who get booted by a dog won't have any drugs on them, or near them, or only in residue form. And the determination can't be challenged by showing officers you're not carrying any drugs. If a dog says you're not allowed to enjoy the music festival, despite having shelled out at least $128, the dog's call is final.

This is a very police state-ish thing to do. It allows police to arbitrarily boot people from venues, depriving them of both their freedom and their money. And it's a coward's way out. Rather than put their own reputations on the line, NSW police are simply going to shrug people express their anger at being kicked out of a concert for drugs they don't have and say a dog told them to do it.

Filed Under: australia, drug dogs, music festivals