Peter A Clarke

Last night Yarra Council passed a motion to “investigate” banning smart glasses at Council leisure centres, childcare centres and playgrounds.

Such a broad ban with carve outs for people with low vision or other disabilities would be difficult to enforce. Ray ban style glasses are quite common and while smart glasses can be distinguished from other sun glasses that requires a council officer coming quite close.

The motion that was passed by Councillor Wade is that Council:

1. Obtain a report before the end of this calendar year on: (a). Updating Council’s conditions of entry and other policies to ban the use of smart glasses” at Council’s leisure centres and all council – run childcare centres and playgrounds, subject to any necessary carve outs for deaf, law vision or disabled users; and 

   (b)   communicating this change in policy to users and relevant stakeholders, including installing signage as necessary.

2. Advocate to the federal government for updates to the Privacy Act to ensure it is fit for purpose and able to respond to the risks of new wearable technology, and for a temporary ban on smart glasses imports, until Australia’s privacy and data collection laws are updated to better protect our communities.

While the Council motion is correct about the Privacy Act requiring more reform there is still scope to bring an action for the tort of serious invasion of privacy through the use of such glasses in certain situations.  Such glasses act in an indentical way as a camera or video, which can be misused.

The Yarra Council statement provides:

Last night, Council endorsed a motion to investigate banning smart glasses at Council leisure centres, childcare centres and playgrounds.

Yarra City Council Mayor Cr Stephen Jolly says smart glasses are a rapidly evolving technology, and it is council’s responsibility to protect the community’s privacy in all council-run spaces.

“Our spaces need to be safe and respectful – especially for the more vulnerable members of our community,” he says.

“This is about protecting people’s privacy, particularly in places where children and families come together,” the Mayor says.

Council resolved to investigate this further, with carve outs for people living with disability who may need this technology to go about their daily lives.

Council will also call on the federal government to bring in stronger privacy laws to further protect people from these new technologies.

The ABC report, Yarra council bans smart glasses from pools, gyms, playgrounds and childcare centres, exaggerates what the motion actually states.  There is no ban as such.  There will be an investigation into a ban.  The ABC sought quotes from participants in the debate and covered broader calls by the Greens to ban such glasses.  It also reports on scepticism of enforcing such a ban.

The article provides:

An inner Melbourne council has voted to ban smart glasses from its pools, gyms, playgrounds and childcare centres due to concerns about vulnerable members of the community being covertly filmed.

The City of Yarra last night voted to ban glasses with in-built cameras from its facilities as well as lobby the federal government to update the Privacy Act to respond to the risks posed by new wearable technologies.

There will be exceptions for users who are hearing impaired, have low vision or other disabilities who are aided by smart glasses.

Yarra councillor Sophie Wade forwarded the motion and said she was particularly worried about children, women and LGBTQI+ people being filmed without their knowledge.

“These glasses are pretty cheap and lots of people could have them very soon,” she told the meeting.

Smart glasses have been available for several years but privacy concerns have grown as cheaper versions arrived on the market for less than $100.

The federal government recently signalled that local councils would be responsible for governing the wearable technology after saying it had no plans to ban imports of smart glasses.

Yarra councillor Andrew Davies said he would not normally support a motion that shifted more responsibility and cost onto local governments.

“But Cr Wade’s got a really good point and we need to do something,” he said.

Yarra mayor Stephen Jolly said he believed the municipality was only the second council in Australia to implement the ban, after Brisbane City Council last month announced a city-wide ban on smart glasses at its public pools.

“We don’t trust the tech bros to do it and the federal government, unfortunately, haven’t brought in legislation on this matter,” Cr Jolly said.

He said the ban would be enforced within days.

“In the wrong hands, in those environments where there’s public toilets, lots of kids hanging around, people swimming, they can be misused,” Cr Jolly said. 

“Because of the lack of control over these glasses by the federal or state governments, councils have had to step up.”

Federal Attorney General Michelle Rowland last week acknowledged community concerns about smart glasses and said she was not ruling out taking other steps to address the risks.

Greens want 12-month ban on wearable devices

Yarra councillor Evangeline Aston voted against the motion.

Cr Aston said she “absolutely” supported the need to protect the community but she did not want council to lobby the federal government to play its part.

“The government has a strong track record of developing terrible legislation when it comes to technology and I simply think we are in a better position to design things for our own local context,” she told the meeting.

She also added that she was not interested in using the council to advance federal Greens party policies.

The Greens announced last month they would push to ban camera-enabled wearable devices for one year while urgent updates to the Privacy Act were made.

“These covert wearables are a disturbing technology,” said senator David Shoebridge.

“They’re built to let someone film you without your knowledge in a change room, on the street, or at your kid’s swimming lesson, and our law does nothing about it.

“Australia’s privacy laws were written four decades before this technology existed, and every day we wait is another day these devices fly off the shelves with no rules attached.”

Cr Aston and Meca Ho were the only two Yarra councillors to vote against the motion.

Cr Jolly said it was “ridiculous” that councils had to take carriage of the issue.

“It’s like saying, ‘there’s no national seatbelt law’, so a council has to say that ‘if you’re driving around Yarra you’ve got to wear a seatbelt’,” he said.

“But maybe we can put the pressure on here by a large council like Brisbane and a smaller council like Yarra in Melbourne, maybe we can start a bit of a trend.”

Former Victorian police officer and cybersecurity expert Susan McLean questioned the effectiveness of a council ban.

“How is it going to be enforced and who is it going to be enforced by?” Ms McLean asked.

“We need more controls on the glasses to start with,” she said.

“In a perfect world, they wouldn’t be available.”