Australia planned to extend visas for Hong Kong residents and encourage businesses there to relocate, he said, adding his government, along with others had been "very consistent in expressing our concerns about the imposition of the national security law on Hong Kong". Students from Hong Kong who graduate from Australia will have the ability to stay for five years and after that, apply for permanent residency.

This would enable a pathway to permanent residency for about 10,000 Hong Kong residents now working and studying in Australia, Mr Morrison said.

USA tech giants face a reckoning over how Hong Kong's security law will reshape their businesses, with their suspension of processing government requests for user data a stop-gap measure as they weigh options, people close to the industry say.

Australia changed its travel advisory for Hong Kong, where around 100,000 Australians live and work, to say "reconsider your need to remain in Hong Kong" if they are concerned about the new law.

The national security law prohibits what Beijing views as secessionist, subversive or terrorist activities or as foreign intervention in Hong Kong affairs.

Immigration Minister Alan Tudge said the government will offer incentives and visa packages to those who decide to move.

Australia last offered "safe haven" visas to Chinese after the bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters around Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Labor backs the visa changes, but is seeking more detail about what it means for family members or people not eligible for the pathway to permanent residency.

"In the past, we've typically received only a relatively small number of requests from Hong Kong authorities, but we are pausing our responses to these requests as we conduct our review".

Morrison announced measures to assist Hong Kong citizens in dealing with the worrisome new legislation which reduces the city's autonomy.

The former British colony became a special administrative region of China on July 1, 1997, when Britain's 99-year lease of the New Territories, north of Hong Kong island, expired.

For the time being Canada is more focused on measures to boost immigration from Hong Kong.

Telegram, another social media platform, said it "has never shared any data with the Hong Kong authorities in the past and does not intend to process any data requests [.] until an global consensus is reached in relation to the ongoing political changes".

China labelled the move "gross interference" in the latest escalation of a bitter diplomatic row with Canberra.

Mr Morrison said the laws undermined Hong Kong's independence, basic law and "one country, two systems" pact with Beijing.

Later Thursday, New Zealand also announced it is "reviewing the settings" of its relationship with Hong Kong, including extradition arrangements, controls on exports of strategic goods and travel advice.