The Albanese government is facing pressure to ban Services Australia from using Israeli spyware that cracks the passcodes on people’s phones as part of investigations of alleged welfare fraud after Australia signed on to a White House statement agreeing to limit the use of the controversial technology.
Cellebrite’s technology allows organisations to make a copy of the contents of the phone and potentially bypass the passcode used to prevent the data being accessed. It has been used in Australia over the past several years by government agencies including the Australian federal police, Victoria police, Asic, the ATO, the Department of Defence and Home Affairs.
