Thousands of prank callers clog up the National Security hotline

THOUSANDS of prank callers are impeding the nation's prime anti-crime hotline with fake reports.

Documents obtained through a Freedom of Information application by The Advertiser show this year already 1385 of the 5684 calls to the 1800 123 400 National Security hotline number have been hoax or nuisance callers wasting the time of national police and anti-terror agencies.

Since the hotline was set up in 2002, operators have been trained to take every call seriously but documents show they have reported that 31,495 calls of the total 156,694 are hoaxes, The Advertiser reported.

Victims of Crime Commissioner Michael O'Connell attacked those who were knowingly wasting the time of police and other crime-fighting authorities.

But he has urged those who genuinely believed they had information, even if it was later proven false, to continue using the service, which was a valuable preventative tool for crime-fighters.

"The line was set up for the purpose of preventing people becoming the victims of terror and it is shameful that people are using it to perpetrate hoaxes," Mr O'Connell said.

"The consequence of the police and other authorities being distracted by such hoaxes puts all of us at risk should there be a genuine terror threat."

Australian Federal Police have credited the hotline since its inception for providing information for every major Australian terror investigation.

The hotline was controversial when first established by the former Howard government with the slogan "be alert but not alarmed" as overkill, possibly leading to the high level of hoax and nuisance calls.

Mr O'Connell said since its original purpose as purely an anti-terror tool, the hotline had transformed into an effective anti-crime device for a broad range of illegal activity as well as terror threats.

"The public at large over the years have become less fearful of terrorism and more concerned with more conventional types of crime, which is leading to more use of the hotline to prevent mainstream crimes," he said.

The information released by the Attorney-General's Department because of the FoI application also shows many people contact the hotline to be comforted about their fear of crime or terrorism, or to seek information about attending a major event or travelling.

These calls accounted for 16,109 of the 156,694 total, while people providing information were numbered at 69,923, emergency callers 26 and people responding to advertising campaigns asking for information numbered 70,638.