Chapter Two - Lost Faxes

My 3 February 1994 letter to Michael Lee, Minister for Communications (see Hacking-Julian Assange File No/27-A) and a subsequent letter from Fay Holthuyzen, assistant to the minister (see Hacking-Julian Assange File No/27-B) to Telstra’s corporate secretary, show I was concerned that my faxes were being illegally intercepted.

An internal government memo, dated 25 February 1994, confirms that the minister advised me that the AFP would investigate my allegations of illegal phone/fax interception. (See Hacking-Julian Assange File No/28)

25 February 1994: This internal Government Memo confirms that the then-Minister for Communications and the Arts had written to me to advise that the Australian Federal Police (AFP) would investigate my allegations of illegal phone/fax interception. (AFP Evidence File No 4)

18 March 1994: This letter from Steve Black, Telstra’s appointed arbitration liaison officer to my arbitration process wrote to Robin Davey, Chairman of AUSTEL AFP Evidence File No 6 under the heading Tape Recorders – Use In Locating Fax Faults noting: 25 February 1994: When this letter to Telstra’s Corporate Secretary from Fay Holthuyzen, Assistant to the Minister for Communications, Michael Lee, is compared to the letter dated 3 February 1994 Exhibit that I sent to the Minister’s office it is clear that I was concerned that his faxes were being illegally intercepted (AFP Evidence File No 5)

“In a small number of cases, where the customer indicates that the problem is specific to transmission between two particular facsimile machines then, with the consent of the customers controlling those facsimile machines, the test transmission between these facsimiles machines will be taped and analysed.

In these cases, recording would be carried out in circumstances where:

the customer’s consent has been confirmed in writing by facsimiles or otherwise;
the recording would be of signals generated by a test message;
there is no B party involved.” (see AFP Evidence File No 6)

I was never warned, either prior, during his arbitrations or, during the seven years after his arbitration, that Telstra was intercepting his faxes as part of their testing process – or for any other reason for that matter – and neither did I ever provide Telstra with written permission for this interception to occur, even though this letter to Mr Davey (AFP File 6) is quite clear that it was mandatory for Telstra to apply for written permission to use tape recorders when intercepting phone calls and/or faxes.