Telstra found divulging web browsing histories without warrant

Telstra has been providing Australian users' web browsing histories to law enforcement agencies without a warrant, a paper published by parliament has revealed.

This comes in spite of claims from ASIO and the AFP that the browsing histories of Australians were only accessible to law enforcement if there had been a warrant.

In fact, at a Senate inquiry last month, outgoing ASIO chief David Irvine assured that in order to gain access to web browsing histories, agencies like ASIO would require a warrant.

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"Web surfing … is not picked up by us and is not regarded by us as metadata; it is regarded as content, and we need to have a warrant for that," Mr Irvine told Senator Scott Ludlam.

The telco’s latest revelation suggests mandatory data retention may still include URLs, according to the Parliamentary Library.

"ASIO and enforcement agencies can themselves authorise disclosure of metadata from telecommunications service providers, without a warrant," the report states.
 
"Industry practice therefore illustrates that URLs are currently provided to law enforcement and national security agencies without a warrant," the report said.

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Telstra’s response to the controversy has been confusing.

While the company defended itself on Twitter, saying they "do not collect and store web browsing history against customer accounts", a Telstra spokeswoman told The Age they had provided URLs to agencies without a warrant “in rare cases”, but did not reveal how often it had done this.