Latest news with #HMASCanberra
Scoop
5 days ago
- Business
- Scoop
New Standards May Be Needed For NZ's Critical Communications Infrastructure
Government officials are looking at developing minimum standards for the protection of critical communications infrastructure. Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment officials joined Media and Communications Minister Paul Goldsmith in a select committee hearing about communications infrastructure on Tuesday. They confirmed the work started by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet to look into cyber resilience for critical national infrastructure was continuing. The project sought consulation from the public in mid-2023 over potential reform and Cabinet in December last year agreed on a National Risk and Resilience Framework to manage risks able to "potentially derail us as a country". The officials said the project was now looking into whether there should be minimum standards for critical infrastructure for cyber-protection. "Most of my conversations with the telecommunications providers in New Zealand, it's obviously they're very, very, very aware of this risk, and it's something they take extremely seriously," MBIE general manager James Hartley told MPs on the committee. He also said a separate project - the Pacific Cyber Security Initiative - had been transferred from the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) to the Government Communications Security Bureau spy agency. It follows an Australian naval ship - the HMAS Canberra - shutting down wireless internet and radio services across much of New Zealand by accident. Hartley said that appeared to be a case of human error. "There is a pretty well established process for visiting naval ships coming to New Zealand, where they apply through MFAT for the frequencies they would like to use when they're in the jurisdiction of New Zealand. "It looks like in this case, the ship may have forgotten to turn its radar off. So that's obviously concerning. Once officials were alerted to that, that was escalated through Defense Force and through the Australian Defense Force and back to the ship, the HMS Canberra, for resolution." Goldsmith said the incident was a concern to him. "That's a ongoing conversation... it is a concern, and we wouldn't want to see it happen too often." During the hearing, Goldsmith also confirmed sattelite communications providers - like Elon Musk's Starlink, and other competitors moving to make use of the technology - would need to be looked at in terms of whether they would need to be regulated in the same ways domestic providers were. Hartley said there were two aspects to that: whether those providers would need to pay the Telecommunications Development Levy, and whether they could be included in dispute resolution provisions like those offered to customers of domestic providers. Goldsmith said, however, that New Zealand had good connectivity overall and with more competition it was going to become "fundamentally almost going to be impossible to get lost in this country in before too long, and which, which, you know, will be transformational in terms of search and rescue and all those sorts of things". The government was also looking at setting up more 5G cell towers.
Otago Daily Times
10-06-2025
- Otago Daily Times
Visitors shouldn't interfere
It is the curious case of the Royal Australian Navy and New Zealand's internet, with more than a passing nod to Isaac Newton's third law of motion. It would be difficult to make this stuff up. As HMAS Canberra, the fleet flagship of our transtasman cousins, sailed along the New Zealand coast and into Cook Strait last week on its way to berth in Wellington, its navigational radar interfered with internet services in Taranaki, Manawatū, Nelson and Marlborough. The blocking of wireless internet and radio services early last Wednesday morning did not last long for some of those regions, though it appears the South Island outages lasted hours, with the ship offshore for most of the day. Once complaints from providers and users were raised with the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment's Radio Spectrum Management, the New Zealand Defence Force was notified, which in turn let its Australian counterparts know what was happening, prompting them to change the radar's frequency. It appears the radar impeded the 5-gigahertz wireless access points which bridge the wired and wireless networks onshore. Interference from the radar on the Canberra tripped the switches on the access points and knocked them offline, an inbuilt precaution to stop wireless signals affecting aviation radar used in New Zealand airspace. MBIE has explained that the country uses different bands of the radio spectrum for different purposes, some of which are shared and available for anyone's use, including the bands for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. The interference from the ship was in one such band. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, Newton says — in this case, the Australian navy knocking out New Zealand internet. It is somewhat unfortunate that the ship's visit was meant to cement goodwill and the sister-city relationship between Wellington and Canberra. And it seems ironic, worrying actually, that if the most friendly of visitors can black out parts of the nation, what might less well-disposed visitors be able to do? Even without a great deal of technological knowledge, it also seems surprising that such a cutting-edge naval system would be using the same parts of the spectrum as everyday Wi-Fi users on land. HMAS Canberra. Photo: Department of Defence As if we needed any more reminding, this incident highlights the fragility of New Zealand's infrastructure. This was just a random event, an unfortunate coincidence that operators on board the Canberra were using the same frequency, but the fact it happened at all is concerning and shows a potential weakness in the system. One of the biggest issues facing the viability of our country over the next several decades is the robustness of existing infrastructure, the cost of its replacement and an ongoing commitment from political parties to build projects which may take several terms of government to complete. New Zealand's leaders are poor at looking beyond the three-year horizon and planning for what may be required by the next generation or generations. The glacial pace of the construction of Dunedin's new hospital is a good example of this. Once upon a time, we had the nous and determination to build major developments, though often at the expense of the environment. Today we quite rightly think more about the environment, but we seem to have lost that expertise for big builds. Taranaki broadband company Primo's managing director, Matthew Harrison, told RNZ internet and phone providers had been asking for a broader spectrum for years to ensure frequencies did not have to be shared. "This is a prime example of what can happen when we're not ... afforded the same spectrum as what some of the bigger players may be, like Starlink and Spark," he said. Telecommunication Users Association chief executive Craig Young agrees there are weaknesses in the radio spectrum and says rural and regional users are especially vulnerable to such interference. Clearly something needs to be done to ensure such failures do not occur again. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says Defence Minister Judith Collins is finding out more about how it happened, and says it was clearly not a "deliberate" action from those on the ship. Lessons have been learned, and now action needs to be taken to stop something like this happening. After all, people's lives and livelihoods are now inextricably linked with the internet.
Epoch Times
10-06-2025
- Business
- Epoch Times
Australian Navy Ship Accidentally Knocks out NZ Internet, Radio Services
A friendly visit from Australia's largest navy vessel, HMAS Canberra, accidentally knocked out a range of internet and radio services in New Zealand. Matthew Harrison, the founder and owner of New Zealand internet service provider (ISP) Primo, said the incident occurred on June 4 and was unlike anything he had ever seen.
NZ Herald
09-06-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Australian warship HMAS Canberra disrupts internet in Taranaki and Marlborough, PM Luxon seeks answers
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon remains unaware of how an Australian warship was allowed accidentally to knock out mobile internet access across Taranaki and Marlborough last week. Navigation radar interference from HMAS Canberra, the Royal Australian Navy's largest warship, disrupted 5 GHz wireless access points on Wednesday as it sailed through
RNZ News
09-06-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
'Government doesn't really know what's going on'- rural ISP boss after warship blocked signals
HMAS Canberra. Photo: AFP A Taranaki internet provider says the government is failing rural New Zealanders by not responding properly to one of last week's internet outages, in particular one caused by a visiting Australian warship. Interference from the HMAS Canberra took out internet and radio services in Taranaki and Marlborough on Wednesday as it sailed into Wellington. Matthew Harrison, managing director of Taranaki Broadband company Primo, said the outage began in the early hours of the morning. "I was quite happily asleep - most people would be at two o'clock in the morning - but [our] alert systems went absolutely nuts with a lot of our access points all going offline and rebooting, and then [staff] raised the alarm to me." While their systems were back online quickly, as the ship continued southwards, it took out other areas, Harrison said. "The poor guys down in Marlborough and Blenheim, it was parked off the coast for most of the day, and it just sat there doing the same thing to them." Harrison said the systems acted as expected - to "vacate channels" for military or aviation radar. But he said internet and phone providers had been asking for years for the spectrum to be increased so different groups were not forced to share frequencies. "Everything that we use for WiFi and mobile coverage and all of that sort of stuff is all using a radio spectrum, and there's only a finite amount that can be shared out for everybody to use… "We've been asking for our own spectrum around this for a long time now, and it's not been forthcoming. And now this is a prime example of what can happen when we're not… afforded the same spectrum as what some of the bigger players may be like, you know, Starlink and Spark and those sort of guys." Prime Minister Christopher Luxon on Morning Report on Monday that Defence Minister Judith Collins ] would be looking into it]. "It seems like the government doesn't really know what's going on," Harrison said. "It's not the fact that, you know, we were taken offline. It's the fact that we don't have spectrum to avoid this happening… the more spectrum that we have, the less likely this is going to happen in the future." He said it should be the job of Communications Minister Paul Goldsmith to sort out, not Collins. Goldsmith told RNZ last week he would be discussing the incident with officials. The blackout came the same week "human error" knocked out fibre-based internet to much of the lower North Island . Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
