Government puts foot down on bugs
The Federal Government will build its own cone of silence in a bid to stop foreign powers listening in on sensitive meetings.
Tender documents showed the Government was looking to build a "transportable secure room solution" shielded from probing radio frequencies and with a high level of "acoustic protection".
The documents, which stopped short of describing exactly what the room would be used for, said the winning design must be easily modified to suit a variety of shapes and sizes and must work in a range of extreme environmental conditions.
The Government specified it would prefer the winning bidder was an Australian company, suggesting it feared a foreign manufacturer might be a security risk.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, which includes spy agency Australian Secret Intelligence Service, is overseeing the project.
MPs and bureaucrats are taking increasingly extreme approaches to security to protect themselves from bugging by intelligence services.
When travelling overseas, ministers take a "clean" phone containing no personal numbers or details and leave their normal mobiles in Australia.
Senior officials also unplug electrical devices such as televisions and clock radios in hotel rooms for fear they could have listening devices.
