Secure communications basics for journalists
A few key tools from our recent workshop.
Journalists need digital security to protect their information sources from prying eyes. Australian laws require ISPs to collect and retain metadata, which can be (ab)used to track down the sources.
Recently, the Australian Federal Police admitted that they had accessed the call records of a journalist without obtaining a ‘journalist information warrant’ first. The illegal access was part of an investigation into a leak.
Just before that, we at CryptoAus ran a workshop with The Walkley Foundation to help journalists communicate with their information sources privately and securely. Our guests had a chance to see and learn using various tools and practices for protecting the identity of their information sources. Here’s what we covered.
Workshop topics
We formed four desks with four different topics covering various challenges journalists may face.
One of the overarching themes was that metadata can be used to reveal the identity of the information source. By applying big data and data-mining techniques, a link between the journalist and the information source can be established. Therefore, journalists not only have to protect the content of their communication with their sources but should leave as little metadata behind as possible.
