Moments in ASIO's history

ASIO has worked to protect Australia and Australians from threats to their security for 75 years. While many things have changed in this time, our purpose has remained constant.

Here we share important moments in ASIO's history and tell the stories behind them. Each played a part in ASIO’s mission, protecting Australia and Australians from threats to their security.

If you are intrigued, you can see and read more about espionage at the National Archives of Australia virtual exhibition Spy: Espionage in Australia.

Establishment of ASIO

When Prime Minister Ben Chifley established ASIO by charter in 1949, Australia and other Western nations had emerged from the Second World War and were grappling with a different kind of threat—Soviet interference.

Sir Charles Spry, Director-General 1950-1970

Brigadier Sir Charles Spry led ASIO from 1950 to 1970 and shaped the organisation as it evolved to counter the threat to Australia and the Commonwealth from the Cold War.

Anne Neill

When Anne Neill raised concerns about communism infiltrating the Women's Peace Council, she could not have known it would lead her all the way to Moscow as an ASIO agent.

The Petrovs

In April 1954, Australia (and ASIO) found itself in the frame of the Cold War with the public announcement by Prime Minister Menzies that Vladimir Mikhailovitch Petrov, a Soviet intelligence officer based in Canberra, had sought political asylum in Australia.

International cooperation

International cooperation, and Australia’s relationship with Great Britain in particular, has been a guiding force in the history of ASIO.

Legislation

ASIO was established in 1949 on an executive order, or charter, from Prime Minister Ben Chifley. This charter detailed the role, functions and limits of Australia’s new security service.

The protest years

people walking down a street and in a car holding protest signs

ASIO had arguably secured a place in the Australian consciousness through the ‘Petrov affair’ and more broadly, via the superpower tensions of the Cold War. But by the 1960s, it found itself operating in a changing social environment.

Terrorism emerges in Australia

front of hilton hotel with truck out the front

As Australia approached the 1970s, ASIO’s investigations into threats to Australia’s security were increasingly expanding beyond our early work investigating communist interference.

Hope Royal Commissions

In 1974, then Prime Minister Gough Whitlam announced a Royal Commission on Intelligence and Security (popularly known as the Hope Royal Commission) to complete a comprehensive inquiry into Australia’s national security agencies, including an examination of their history, administrative structures and functions.