Countries accused of espionage in Australia include China, India, Israel, Russia, the Soviet Union and the United States.
In May 2024, it was reported that more than 1,200 Chinese spies were operating in Australia. [1]
On 30 April 2024, It was reported in the media that in 2020, Australia removed a "nest of spies" from the country. [2] [3] [4]
In August 2024, ASIO director Mike Burgess claimed that Iran had been one of "three or four" foreign countries spying on and attempting to intimidate diaspora communities in Australia. [3]
On 11 July 2024, two Russian-born Australians were arrested for allegedly conspiring the share ADF secrets with Russia. [4]
Throughout the Cold War, the United States maintained a number of "informants" throughout Australian political life. Most notable was head of ACTU Bob Hawke, who later became PM. [5] Several authors such as John Pilger have alleged CIA involvement in the 1975 Whitlam dismissal. [6] In 2010, the United States diplomatic cables leak published by WikiLeaks exposed a number of politicians as informants for the US Embassy, such as Mark Arbib [7] and Peter Khalil. [8]
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation is the domestic intelligence and national security agency of the Commonwealth of Australia, responsible for the protection of the country and its citizens from espionage, sabotage, acts of foreign interference, politically motivated violence, terrorism and attacks on the national defence system. ASIO is a primary entity of the Australian Intelligence Community.
The Australian Signals Directorate (ASD), formerly the Defence Signals Directorate, is a statutory agency of the Government of Australia responsible for signals intelligence, providing intelligence support to Australian military operations, conducting cyberwarfare and ensuring information security. The ASD is a part of the larger Australian Intelligence Community, and its role within the so-called Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance is to monitor signals intelligence in South and East Asia. The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) is an agency within the ASD.
The United Kingdom – United States of America Agreement is a multilateral agreement for cooperation in signals intelligence between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The alliance of intelligence operations is also known as the Five Eyes. In classification markings this is abbreviated as FVEY, with the individual countries being abbreviated as AUS, CAN, NZL, GBR, and USA, respectively.
The Ministry of State Security is the principal civilian intelligence, security and secret police agency of the People's Republic of China, responsible for foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, and the political security of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). One of the largest and most secretive intelligence organizations in the world, it is headquartered in the Haidian District of Beijing, with powerful semi-autonomous branches at the provincial, city, municipality and township levels throughout China.
The Government of China is engaged in espionage overseas, directed through diverse methods via the Ministry of State Security (MSS), the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), the United Front Work Department (UFWD), People's Liberation Army (PLA) via its Intelligence Bureau of the Joint Staff Department, and numerous front organizations and state-owned enterprises. It employs a variety of tactics including cyber espionage to gain access to sensitive information remotely, signals intelligence, human intelligence as well as influence operations through united front activity targeting overseas Chinese communities and associations. The Chinese government is also engaged in industrial espionage aimed at gathering information and technology to bolster its economy, as well as transnational repression of dissidents abroad such as supporters of the Tibetan independence movement and Uyghurs as well as the Taiwan independence movement, the Hong Kong independence movement, Falun Gong, pro-democracy activists, and other critics of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The United States alleges that the degree of intelligence activity is unprecedented in its assertiveness and engagement in multiple host countries, particularly the United States, with economic damages estimated to run into the hundreds of billions according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
The Five Eyes (FVEY) is an Anglosphere intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These countries are party to the multilateral UK-USA Agreement, a treaty for joint cooperation in signals intelligence. Informally, "Five Eyes" can refer to the group of intelligence agencies of these countries. The term "Five Eyes" originated as shorthand for a "AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY" (AUSCANNZUKUS) releasability caveat.
WikiLeaks is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources. It was founded in 2006 by Julian Assange, an Australian editor, publisher, and activist. Since September 2018, Kristinn Hrafnsson has served as its editor-in-chief. Its website states that it has released more than ten million documents and associated analyses. WikiLeaks' most recent publication of original documents was in 2019 and its most recent publication was in 2021. From November 2022, numerous documents on the organisation's website became inaccessible. In 2023, Assange said that WikiLeaks is no longer able to publish due to his imprisonment and the effect that US government surveillance and WikiLeaks' funding restrictions were having on potential whistleblowers.
Julian Paul Assange is an Australian editor, publisher, and activist who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. He came to international attention in 2010 after WikiLeaks published a series of leaks from Chelsea Manning, a United States Army intelligence analyst: footage of a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad, U.S. military logs from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, and U.S. diplomatic cables. Assange has won multiple awards for publishing and journalism.
The Afghan War documents leak, also called the Afghan War Diary, is a collection of internal U.S. military logs of the War in Afghanistan, which was published by WikiLeaks on 25 July 2010. The logs consist of over 91,000 Afghan War documents, covering the period between January 2004 and December 2009. Most of the documents are classified secret. As of 28 July 2010, only 75,000 of the documents have been released to the public, a move which WikiLeaks says is "part of a harm minimization process demanded by [the] source". Prior to releasing the initial 75,000 documents, WikiLeaks made the logs available to The Guardian, The New York Times and Der Spiegel in its German and English online edition, which published reports in line with an agreement made earlier the same day, 25 July 2010.
Cyberwarfare by China is the aggregate of cyberattacks attributed to the organs of the People's Republic of China and various related advanced persistent threat (APT) groups.
George Sadil is a former Russian analyst and translator who worked with the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) for nearly 25 years including during the height of the Cold War. After it had been revealed the ASIO had been compromised by a Russian KGB 'mole', investigations were held and after internal audits conducted by both ASIO (Jabaroo) and the Australian Federal Police, Sadil was accused of being the mole. After raids on the homes of many of their analysts and translators, the authorities found highly classified documents in Sadil's home, he was then charged with possessing classified federal documents under the Crimes Act 1914. In 1994 the case against him collapsed. Sadil's profile did not match that of the mole in question, and prosecutors were unable to establish any kind of money trail between Sadil and the KGB.
Content from the United States diplomatic cables leak has depicted Australia and related subjects extensively. The leak, which began on 28 November 2010, occurred when the website of WikiLeaks — an international new media non-profit organisation that publishes submissions of otherwise unavailable documents from anonymous news sources and news leaks — started to publish classified documents of detailed correspondence — diplomatic cables — between the United States Department of State and its diplomatic missions around the world. WikiLeaks was releasing documents each day since the initial release date, but published the entire collection unredacted following the partially accidental publication of the passphrase to the symmetrically encrypted GPG file WikiLeaks had placed online and provided to The Guardian. The journalists had published the passphrase as the title of a chapter in a book on the process of investigating and publishing the stories believing that the encrypted file had only been provided to them with that passphrase and not realising the entire encrypted file was still online.
WikiLeaks, a whistleblowing website founded by Julian Assange, has received praise as well as criticism from the public, hacktivists, journalist organisations and government officials. The organisation has revealed human rights abuses and was the target of an alleged "cyber war". Allegations have been made that Wikileaks worked with or was exploited by the Russian government and acted in a partisan manner during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
WikiLeaks began publishing emails leaked from strategic intelligence company Stratfor on 27 February 2012 under the title Global Intelligence Files. By July 2014, WikiLeaks had published 5,543,061 Stratfor emails. Wikileaks partnered with more than 25 world media organisations, including Rolling Stone, L’Espresso and The Hindu to analyse the documents.
In 2012, while on bail, Julian Assange was granted political asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he sought to avoid extradition to Sweden, and what his supporters said was the possibility of subsequent extradition to the US. On 11 April 2019, Ecuador revoked his asylum, he was arrested for failing to appear in court, and carried out of the embassy by members of the London Metropolitan Police. Following his arrest, he was charged and convicted, on 1 May 2019, of violating the Bail Act, and sentenced to fifty weeks in prison. While in prison the US revealed a previously sealed 2018 US indictment in which Assange was charged with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion related to his involvement with Chelsea Manning and WikiLeaks.
Wang Liqiang, or William Wang, is a Chinese defector to Australia and self-proclaimed former spy. In November 2019, Wang sought political asylum in Australia, claiming to be a spy who was involved in the People's Republic of China's intervention in the affairs of Hong Kong SAR and Taiwan. The factual accuracy of his claims has been disputed, and some experts suggested he may be no more than a low-level operative. China has claimed that Wang's allegations were "absurd" and that he is a "fraud".
Kunstler v. Central Intelligence Agency is a lawsuit against the Central Intelligence Agency, former CIA Director Mike Pompeo, Undercover Global S.L., and David Morales Guillen filed by a group of American lawyers and journalists associated with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The lawsuit alleged that the CIA violated their constitutional rights by recording their conversations with Assange and copying their devices after suspicions were raised that Assange was working for the Russian intelligence services.
Alleged CIA involvement in the Whitlam dismissal refers to allegations that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) affected the dismissal of Labor Party Prime Minister Gough Whitlam by unelected Governor-General John Kerr, who several authors have alleged had several ties to the OSS and its successor, the CIA.
United States espionage in Australia refers to confirmed and alleged cases of espionage and political interference carried out in Australia by the United States.