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 People are entering the waters off the west coast of Australia rather gingerly these days. Following a fatal attack on a surfer at Gracetown, 270 km south of Perth, on Nov. 23 — the second shark attack reported that day and the sixth fatality in the past two years — the state of Western Australia now holds the unenviable reputation as the world’s deadliest place for shark attacks. 
 
 In response, the Western Australian government has announced a controversial new shark-mitigation program that will see 72 drum lines (baited hooks attached to floatation devices) placed at eight popular beaches. Professional fishermen will be contracted to remove and destroy any shark larger than 3 m spotted near those beaches. 
 
 The move has sparked outrage from the people it aims to protect, with more than 4,500 Western Australians attending a protest at Perth’s Cottesloe Beach last weekend and similar protests taking place in Sydney, Melbourne, the Gold Coast and five other cities. 
 
 “While the rest of the world is turning to shark conservation, our government is sticking his head in the sand, ignoring all the experts and employing an archaic strategy,” Western Australians for Shark Conservation founder Ross Weir tells TIME. “What they are doing is illegal and violates 15 different United Nations conventions and treaties.” 
 
 The authorities, however, remain unmoved. “While we understand this policy will be divisive and cause anxiety for some in the community, it is clear that the number of fatalities in recent years required a stronger response, particularly for … the divers, surfers and swimmers who love to use the water,” says acting Premier Kim Hames. He adds that the policy was developed in consultation with more than 40 shark experts and based on shark-control programs that have been operating for decades in the Australian states of New South Wales and Queensland as well as Natal in South Africa. 
 
 However, data collected by the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board shows the bycatch from drum lining — which causes fatalities among small whales, dolphins, marine turtles and other endangered and innocent species — outnumbers the target catch by 5 to 1. Even when the large numbers of sharks are removed from the ocean, as took place in Hawaii in the 1960s and ’70s when nearly 4,700 sharks were culled, the approach fails to produce a measurable decrease in attacks. 
 
 Some experts are even warning that drum lines will increase the number of shark attacks. “Whenever you put bait in the water, you always risk bringing something to the area that was not there before,” says Nathan Hart, an associate professor at the University of Western Australia’s School of Animal Biology. 
 
 The most controversial aspect of the Western Australia plan is that it targets, among other species, the iconic great white shark. With great whites protected in Australia as an endangered species (due to a low rate of reproduction that makes them vulnerable to population collapse), there are thought to be fewer than 3,500 of them left in the ocean. 
 
 “The great white is an [International Union for Conservation of Nature] red-listed species with a higher protection status than humpback whales,” says Jeff Hanson, director of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society of Australia. “The species is on life support and the Western Australian government wants to pull the plug. It’s indulging in hysteria,” he says, adding that his organization is considering mounting a legal challenge. 
 
 Instead of culling sharks, conservationists suggest research is the key to reducing attacks. Hart is currently leading a project funded by the Western Australian government to define the visual, electrical and vibrational cues that trigger shark attacks. The findings will be used to design the next generation of deterrent devices. Perth-based company Shark Shield, which sells such devices, has also been awarded a government grant to develop a new and improved version of its product that can be built into new surfboards or retrofitted into existing boards. 
 
 Then there’s social media, which is already helping humans coexist with the ocean’s apex predator. Western Australia’s fisheries department has attached transmitters to 320 large sharks that send tweets whenever any of the sharks move within 500 m of the shore. The tweets, posted on the Twitter account of Surf Life Saving Western Australia, inform beachgoers of the exact location, type and size of the shark. The project has proved exceedingly popular, quadrupling the SLSWA’s Twitter base from 8,000 to 27,500 in the space of a week, and attracted praise from celebrity shark advocate Richard Branson, who called it “another great example of technology helping to preserve the balance of man and nature.” ||||| ABC News Australia via Reuters Rescuers respond to a fatal shark attack about 90 miles north of Perth, Australia, on July 14. A surfer was killed by a shark, bringing to five the number of fatal attacks in Western Australia in the past year. 
 
 Following a record number of attacks this year, and retracting his earlier stand, the leader of a state on Australia's west coast announced Thursday that any great white sharks seen near beachgoers would be killed in order to prevent attacks on humans. 
 
 "We will always put the lives and safety of beachgoers ahead of the shark," Western Australia Premier Colin Barnett told ABC Radio Australia. "This is, after all, a fish — let's keep it in perspective." 
 
 Previously, sharks could only be hunted if there had already been an attack on a swimmer and, even after a fatal attack last March, Barnett had ruled out changing that strategy, saying "the ocean is the domain of the shark and we go there with a risk always." 
 
 But the state has now seen five deaths this year — out of a total of just 12 recorded over the last 100 years. 
 
 The new strategy includes more watercraft and helicopter patrols as well, but it was not welcomed by everyone. 
 
 The Conservation Council of Western Australia called it a "guilty until proven innocent" approach, The Australian reported. 
 
 Authorities are searching for the large shark after it killed a surfer on Saturday off the Australia coast. The shark was believed to be at least 13 feet long. NBC's Duncan Golestani reports. 
 
 "This may be the most reactionary and archaic response I have seen in my lifetime of shark study," added George Burgess, curator of the University of Florida's International Shark Attack File. 
 
 "Such methods run totally in contrast to modern scientific thinking," he told NBC News, noting that "no evidence" from the 5,000 attacks on file suggest that sharks have become more aggressive toward humans. In fact, only two or maybe three of those attacks can even be attributed to one shark involved in multiple strikes. 
 
 Western Australia's strategy, he added, "is particularly ill-founded in that it involves a protected species — an animal already acknowledged to be in trouble not only in Australia but in most areas of its biological range. 
 
 "We're supposed to be smarter than the average shark," he said, adding that scientists know general shark migratory patterns and that can be used to better warn beachgoers and even close beaches ahead of time when needed. 
 
 Great white sharks have been a protected species in Australian waters for more than a decade, but Barnett's fisheries minister last July suggested it might be time to review that. 
 
 A great white shark attacked and killed a 33-year-old diver in Australia, the fourth such attack in seven months. NBC's Annabelle Roberts reports. 
 
 "I wonder if research might tell us that there are now much greater number of great whites than ever before, and maybe we should look at whether they should remain a protected species," Norman Moore told reporters. 
 
 Burgess said any culling would further threaten the species. "It's sad they're going after one of the animals that can least take that fishing pressure" since it is relatively scarce in the ocean. 
 
 More than 100 species of shark are found in Australian waters but most are not aggressive. The great white, tiger and bull sharks are considered the most dangerous. 
 
 Great whites prefer the colder and temperate waters of Australia's south, while tiger and bull sharks are more common in northern tropical waters. 
 
 Burgess said there is no evidence showing that sharks "hang around" beaches and instead they tend to follow migratory patterns in search of food like whales. 
 
 Still, France last month authorized a cull of around 20 sharks off its Indian Ocean island of Reunion after a series of attacks in the surfing hot spot. 
 
 A man has suffered serious injuries after being bitten by a shark on the east coast of Australia. Msnbc.com's Alex Witt reports. 
 
 In the U.S., "preventive hunting of white sharks" is not allowed, Monica Allen, a spokeswoman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told NBC News. "White sharks are an important part of the ocean ecosystem," she said, and instead "coastal communities and states use public education to help reduce the risk of shark attacks, which are rare." 
 
 Burgess said great whites along both U.S. coasts probably number in the low thousands, and Allen said the species appears to be seeing pressure. 
 
 "In the Atlantic, white sharks are prohibited from being landed by fishermen because of the status of the stock," she said. "NOAA is also reviewing a petition to consider listing the Pacific white shark under the Endangered Species Act." 
 
 Reuters contributed to this report. 
 
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– Australia has seen a big increase in shark attacks in recent years, including a record five deaths in 2012—all of which is bad news for swimmers and now for sharks as well. The state of Western Australia has put into place an aggressive new policy to track and kill sharks spotted anywhere in the general vicinity of swimmers, reports the Australian. It's a major shift from previous policy, which allowed such hunts only after attacks. "We will always put the lives and safety of beachgoers ahead of the shark," said Premier Colin Barnett. "This is, after all, a fish—let's keep it in perspective." The change, along with Barnett's it's-just-a-fish remark, has conservation groups seething. One condemns it as a "guilty until proven innocent" policy. NBC News notes that as recently as March, after a fatal attack, Barnett rejected the idea of changing the policy: "The ocean is the domain of the shark and we go there with a risk always." The subsequent deaths ramped up political pressure to do something, however.