Senetas says NBN traffic should be encrypted

Stuart Corner
Thursday, 10 February 2011 14:09

Business IT - Networking

ASX listed encryption technology developer Senetas (ASX: SEN) has told a parliamentary enquiry that all traffic on the National Broadband Network should be encrypted.

In its submission to the House Standing Committee on Infrastructure and Communications' enquiry into the NBN, Senetas CEO John DuBois says an unsecured NBN would be "an uninsured vehicle on the global superhighway. Citing items in the enquiry's terms of reference he says: "We are most concerned that the network is essentially not secure and this will impact its ability to effectively deliver [terms of reference] (f) through (i).

Under those items in the TOR, the committee was required to "Examine the capacity of the National Broadband Network to contribute to:'¦business efficiencies and revenues, particularly for small and medium business, and Australia's export market; interaction with research and development and related innovation investments; facilitating community and social benefits; and the optimal capacity and technological requirements of a network to deliver these outcomes."

DuBois claims that "Without a properly designed security focus, deployed through dedicated encryption hardware, communications from and to governments, enterprises, small businesses, researchers/innovators and individuals poses a significant risk'¦.Organisations looking to take advantage of the new opportunities the NBN will present must accept the risk their intellectual property will be transmitted over the fibre optic NBN "in the clear" and therefore at risk of data interception.

DuBois paints a picture of potential data loss on an industrial scale, reminding the committee that the entire stash of documents at the core of the Wikileaks revelations are believed to have come from a single 740MB CD Rom.

"Should there be a breach of the NBN, it will result in massive data loss'¦An accidental leak or a deliberate act such as a fibre optic tap on NBN traffic travelling at 10 Gbps could result in the loss of 1.04 million unencrypted records every five seconds, 12 million records a minute, or one billion pieces of information in 90 minutes."

The NBN was referred to the committee on 7 December 2010  by the minister for infrastructure and transport, Anthony Albanese. Submissions close on 25 February and it is due to report in August.

Perhaps not surprisingly after the degree of Parliamentary scrutiny to which the NBN has already been subject, there has been little response. As of 10 February, the enquiry had received only nine responses: all except Senetas' from local councils.