Monitoring

[science_fox]

My work now sends a Travel Risk assessment for every journey booked through their systems. Even UK-UK
. It's compiled by some 3rd party and produces a 36 page report! Which is outrageous waste of everybody's time, although I'm sure mostly automatically scraped, it doesn't even read like it's UKGov travel advice.

As it's the first time I've travelled for a while I@'d not seen it before and actually skimmed it. It does contain 1 slightly alarming line

"The country is known for its surveillance of telephone and electronic communications and travellers should assume that communication is monitored all the time. Online activities may be monitored. Cybercriminal groups may be present in the country. Exercise discretion in deciding to bring sensitive data into the country"

a) I'm already in the country and have no choice about my sensitive data
b) really? I though we basically weren't actively monitored unless a specific warrant is raised when archived data may be inspected. Recording/storing is not the same as looking at it???
c) You've just sent my travel details (hopefully generic, I have no way to know!) to a 3rd party and you're mithering about data security?!

[Chris Preston]

I got one of these as well. It had a long section on making sure I reassessed my need to travel due to the dangers of cyclones in Queensland, despite the fact that I was travelling from Adelaide to Melbourne as was stated on the first page. There was also the advice that I should pack anti-malarials, even though a separate section stated I would be safe from malaria, because it does not occur in Australia. It also contained the advice that I should avoid spending time in the foyer of the hotel I might be staying in, because if there were to be a terrorist attack on the hotel, the lobby is a dangerous place to be.* There was so much overly-detailed advice about situations that were exceptionally unlikely to occur, that the document was largely useless. It also stated I was required to download their app and put my personal information into it. As, if.

When I travel overseas, I can get the crucial safety information in a page or less from the DFAT website. A long recitation of vanishingly small risks is more confusing than helpful.

*This is arguably true. However, the last terrorist attack on a building in Australia was the 1995 bombing of the French Consulate in Perth. The last terrorist attack on a hotel in Australia was in 1978.