Locke Keith: Government Communications Security Bureau Bill — In Committee 
Locke Keith: Government Communications Security Bureau Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:607;Page:4398] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I think the problem here is that people do not quite understand the technology of interception. This part has a provision on interceptions without warrants and the reason there is such a clause is that when we are talking about something like the Waihopai satellite communications interception system it is a vacuum cleaner - type system. It draws down millions of communications passing through two communications satellites and it then filters those communications by using key words key telephone numbers fax numbers destination phone numbers and origin phone numbers etc. 
But the key word system in particular is very hard for New Zealand to control when we are part of—and Richard Prebble referred to this—a five-nation network with Britain the United States Canada Australia and ourselves. One can put a key word in. I think Ron Mark mentioned a name that he used to get called by although I have forgotten what it was now. But that name could be put in the system—the National Security Agency puts a whole lot of those key words into the Echelon system that the five nations are part of—and how will the Government Communications Security Bureau here figure out what that name means or why it is spying on Ron Mark under that particular name? 
There is no way practically that New Zealand can exercise its sovereignty when for example the Waihopai system was used for the war in Afghanistan—and we have a report for the US Congress put out on 11 July last year that talks about Waihopai being used for that. It states that. It refers to the SAS stating “Helen Clark recently acknowledged the presence of SAS forces on the ground in Afghanistan.” The report goes on to state: “Intelligence support was offered as well. New Zealand’s Waihopai monitoring station is part of the five-nation Echelon network.” That report admits that communications concerning Afghanistan were being intercepted at Waihopai. That was part of our contribution to that war. 
Now how can we guarantee that that same five-nation system is not intercepting communications and using them for the Americans’ effort against Iraq? That is the problem. It is part of the technology of interception. It is not just that one interception device is being put on one wire between two people. People say that the interception will not target domestic communications. Well of course that is a great principle but how will it be carried out in practice when we have something like Waihopai? If we intercept a communication of my colleague Ron Mark there under his pseudonym how would we know whether he was a New Zealander? That would not be in the communication. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: We checked. He’s all right. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: The member checked? So the problem is that the key word system sweeps up a whole lot of innocent people. 
When the Law and Order Committee was hearing submissions on the Crimes Amendment Bill (No 6) which gave the Government Communications Security Bureau authorisation to intercept communications including at Waihopai a Wellington woman by the name of Anna Willing gave evidence to the committee. She said she had sent an email to a friend in America on the eve of the presidential elections. Her friend had been visited by the FBI which had intercepted the email she had received from that New Zealand woman because it had three words in it: “presidential” “election” and “funeral”. Anna Willing had said in that communication that she could not watch the presidential elections on TV because she was going to a funeral but that combination of words was intercepted either at this end or at the FBI end—who knows? That communication did lead to an FBI investigation of her friend. That is what such mass interception can lead to. 
The Privacy Commissioner had laid out certain proposals which I have put into Supplementary Order Paper 61. The report back on the bill is very short and to the point. It does not deal with the Privacy Commissioner’s questions at all. I say that the Government should answer them.