Leaking boats and borders: The virtu of surveilling Australia's refugee population

When refugees displaced to Australia’s offshore detention do speak, it is through surveillance upended through publicity and violations of privacy. Weak legal rights to privacy in Australia juxtapose the increasing secrecy under which the Australian state operates its own offshore detention centres (Manus Island and Nauru) while increasing the mandate of data retention at home. Australia’s institutional context offers visibility to these concerns of surveillance whereby we find an acceleration of prohibitive privacy for government and prohibitive transparency for individuals. Our analysis of this country synthesises media-law in practice with theories of mediated visibility (Flyverbom 2016, 2017; Brighenti 2010), to understand Australian privacy, media and immigration law in the context of pervasive surveillance and the radical management of visibility. Our contribution speaks to applicable privacy concerns for states grappling with invasive data collection and its relation to the (prohibiting of the private) voice of the surveilled, which we see as doubly acute for those left vulnerable in Australia’s borderzones.

[1]  C. Maylea,et al.  Social Workers as Collaborators? The Ethics of Working Within Australia’s Asylum System* , 2018 .

[2]  Khiara M. Bridges,et al.  The Poverty of Privacy Rights , 2017 .

[3]  B. Brevini.  Metadata Laws, Journalism and Resistance in Australia , 2017 .

[4]  Nicolas Suzor,et al.  The passage of Australia’s data retention regime: national security, human rights, and media scrutiny , 2017 .

[5]  R. Barros.  On the Outside Looking In: Secrecy and the Study of Authoritarian Regimes* , 2016 .

[6]  B. Offord,et al.  Human rights in Papua New Guinea: is this where we should be settling refugees? , 2016 .

[7]  Mikkel Flyverbom,et al.  Transparency: Mediation and the Management of Visibilities , 2016 .

[8]  M. O’sullivan,et al.  NOT FOR EXPORT: THE FAILURE OF AUSTRALIA’S EXTRATERRITORIAL PROCESSING REGIME IN PAPUA NEW GUINEA AND THE DECISION OF THE , 2016 .

[9]  C. Henderson.  Australia’s Treatment of Asylum Seekers From Human Rights Violations to Crimes Against Humanity , 2014 .

[10]  L. Briskman.  Technology, Control, and Surveillance in Australia’s Immigration Detention Centres , 2013 .

[11]  P. Tschakert,et al.  Situated Resilience: Reframing Vulnerability and Security in the Context of Climate Change , 2013 .

[12]  B. Saul.  Dark Justice: Australia's Indefinite Detention of Refugees on Security Grounds under International Human Rights Law , 2012 .

[13]  M. Pearson.  The media regulation debate in a democracy lacking a free expression guarantee , 2012 .

[14]  M. Foster.  The Implications of the Failed 'Malaysian Solution': The Australian High Court and Refugee Responsibility Sharing at International Law , 2012 .

[15]  Rob Nicholls,et al.  Right to Privacy: Telephone Interception and Access in Australia , 2012, IEEE Technology and Society Magazine.

[16]  A. Brighenti.  Visibility in Social Theory and Social Research , 2010 .

[17]  D. Malone.  International Criminal Justice , 2008 .

[18]  Dean Wilson,et al.  Australian Biometrics and Global Surveillance , 2007 .

[19]  R. Devetak.  In fear of refugees: the politics of Border Protection in Australia , 2004 .

[20]  Dean Wilson,et al.  Surveillance, Risk and Preemption on the Australian Border , 2002 .

[21]  David Lyon,et al.  The Electronic Eye: The Rise of Surveillance Society , 1994 .

[22]  James S. Ettema,et al.  On the Epistemology of Investigative Journalism. , 1984 .