Friday, March 06, 2015



How to complain to IGIS

Are you a New Zealand citizen or permanent resident? Have you travelled to the South Pacific (Fiji, Samoa, New Caledonia, Tonga, French Polynesia, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Nauru or Kiribati) for work or a holiday since 2009? Congratulations, the GCSB collected every phone call and email you sent as part of its new "full take" collection.

This is illegal. The GCSB is not allowed to spy on New Zealanders. Fortunately, we have an Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security to investigate the spies when they violate the law. The Greens lodged a complaint with them this morning. But if you'd like to do the same, the Inspector-General has a handy online guide. The short version:

  • Email the Registrar of the High Court at Wellington at WellingtonHC@justice.govt.nz. Say that this is a complaint for IGIS care of the Registrar. Note that the Electronic Transactions Act 2002 means that an email counts as "in writing".
  • Include your name, address, and contact details. State whether you are an NZ citizen or resident.
  • State the period when you were travelling the in the Pacific, and whether you made any phone calls or sent any emails.
  • State that recent revelations from the Snowden documents have given you reason to believe that those emails may have been intercepted as part of their "mass collection". Include links to relevant media articles.
  • Ask IGIS to inquire into whether your information has been destroyed as required under s23 GCSB Act, and if not, to ensure its destruction. Also ask for copies of what was intercepted.

The government assures us that the Inspector-General protects our privacy from the excesses of our spy agencies. So, lets see if the system works. And if it doesn't, then we'll all know that its a charade and that we should burn it down and build a new one.