My first impression was that they had no intention of going to court with the data they were after, but then again I've not read up on any legal case studies involving digital forensic evidence handling which are publicly available in Australia (how would a magistrate even deal with that sort of evidence if it can legally be modified? I'm not sure any of these new laws have been tested in court before).
It's nuts that something that used to be seen as solid evidence in court could now be seen as totally unreliable, and just because someone may present it saying "trust me because I'm a cop" means absolutely nothing when someone has a duty to factor the human element into the equation. The guidelines regarding the handling of digital forensic evidence (and all types of evidence for that matter) were designed to deal with this. So yeah, I think what I'm trying to say here is that among the new laws, that one in particular could do much more harm than good due to being so vague in its wording and scope. From what I've read about the US court system, this type of evidence would no longer be permitted in 99.9% of cases, It wouldn't matter if you're the damn pope presenting it, everyone's human. I actually wish I knew a magistrate in real life to ask them how they would handle a case involving this law and a drive handed to them by some prosecution team involving the AFP.
It's nuts that something that used to be seen as solid evidence in court could now be seen as totally unreliable, and just because someone may present it saying "trust me because I'm a cop" means absolutely nothing when someone has a duty to factor the human element into the equation. The guidelines regarding the handling of digital forensic evidence (and all types of evidence for that matter) were designed to deal with this. So yeah, I think what I'm trying to say here is that among the new laws, that one in particular could do much more harm than good due to being so vague in its wording and scope. From what I've read about the US court system, this type of evidence would no longer be permitted in 99.9% of cases, It wouldn't matter if you're the damn pope presenting it, everyone's human. I actually wish I knew a magistrate in real life to ask them how they would handle a case involving this law and a drive handed to them by some prosecution team involving the AFP.