Australia will name countries found to be undermining the nation’s political processes.

And spy agencies will be tasked with designing programs for identified communities most at-risk of being targeted for foreign interference.

The announcement comes ahead of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese giving an address next week on national security to the National Press Club in Canberra.

In a speech to the Australian National University, Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil also revealed ASIO recently foiled a foreign interference operation by the Iranian regime.

The plot was aimed at an Iranian-Australian linked to locally held protests over the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who died in police custody after she was detained by Iran’s morality police for failing to wear her hijab correctly.

Ms O’Neil said the government would call out the “egregious acts” of individual countries when it was in the national interest to do so.

She said ASIO and the Department of Home Affairs would be asked to develop a new program for people at risk of being targeted for foreign interference, which would help them understand what this looked like and how they could respond.

“It’s time to bring foreign interference out of the shadows and into the light,” she told the ANU National Security College on Tuesday.

“As minister for home affairs, there is something direct and practical I can do to help equip Australians to fight this problem – to talk as openly as I can about foreign interference in Australia.”

Ms O’Neil also referred to unnamed countries that had tried to “collect sensitive personal information of individuals seen as dissidents by the foreign government due to their activism”.

“There are examples of individuals arranging counter-protests to instigate arguments with activists with the intent of provoking violence – all at the request of a foreign intelligence service,” she said.

Liberal senator Claire Chandler said the Australian community was entitled to more transparency about the action being taken by the government.

“How can the minister (O’Neil) declare to the Iranian-Australian community that this activity was ‘shut down immediately’ when in fact Iranian-Australians continue to report harassment and targeting of their families in Iran,” she said.

Opposition countering foreign interference spokesman James Paterson urged the government to impose the “strongest possible” response.

“Every Australian is entitled to peacefully protest,” he said.

“It is the responsibility of the Albanese government to protect these democratic rights with the strongest possible response to deter this activity and send a clear message to those responsible that it will not be tolerated.”

– AAP