The Hon Micheal Kirby, former High Court Justice, in a recent article, Privacy: An Elusive and Changing Concept, in the Griffith Journal of Law and Human Dignity, and the Hon Justice Peter Applegarth, in a speech in May 2012, Privacy and the media, have provided valuable contributions to a discussion of privacy as a legal construct and its future development, if any, in Australian jurisprudence.

The Kirby article provides a very comprehensive historical background and the influence of overseas developments in the area.  It provides, absent citations:

Daniel Solove is one of leading privacy academics, at Georgetown University,  in the United States.  He is also a prolific author; including Nothing to Hide,  Understanding Privacy and The future of reputation.

In Employers and Schools that Demand Account Passwords and the Future of Cloud Privacy he raises the not unknown phenomana of prospective and actual employers demanding social media passwords so they may access employess/applicants’ social media pages.

The response Read the rest of this entry »

In this post I have undertaken a general review of the Privacy Amendment (Privacy Alerts) Bill 2013 and each of its provisions.  The Bill’s homepage is found here.

SECOND READING SPEECH

In any review it is useful to set out the second reading speech of the Minister responsible for the legislation.  In this case that is the Attorney General, Mark Dreyfuss.

It provides:

The introduction of the Privacy Amendment (Privacy Alerts) Bill 2013 is the next key step in the government’s major reform of Australia’s privacy laws.

It is a long overdue measure that was recommended by the Australian Law Reform Commission in 2008.

It will introduce a new consumer privacy protection for Australians that will keep their personal information more secure in the digital age. It will also encourage agencies and private sector organisations to improve their data security practices.

In its 2008 privacy report, the Australian Law Reform Commission found that, as government agencies and large companies collected more and more personal information online, there was an increasing risk that this could become subject to data breaches. There were studies to show that the frequency of data breaches was increasing and their consequences were becoming more severe.

This trend has continued Read the rest of this entry »

Cynthia Karena, a Fairfax journalist, spoke with me about privacy and data collection just before I left for Massachusetts to present a paper at MIT8.  The presentation at the MIT was on the topic of Managing your Identity On Line.

In Data collection a growing threat to our privacy Ms Karena addresses the issue of data aggregation and use of algorithims in tracking individuals on line.  She quoted some of our discussion in what was a broad ranging discussion. Some of the issues raised in this article I covered in my presentation in the United States.

The article provides:

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg assures us that users of the ubiquitous social media site are happy with ads tailored to them, but others are less sanguine about the use of Facebook details for commercial use, not to mention the rest of our personal information that’s sloshing around the internet.

Whenever we Read the rest of this entry »

The Victorian Law Reform Committee inquiry into Sexting has produced a 252 report.  It is found here.

The focus in the media has been on the recommendation to reform the law so as not to target those who were not intended to be the target of prosecutions, such as young teenageers.  The Committee recommended a range of defences to avoid the unintended consequences of how the law currently operates.  In its deliberations the Committee looked at the broader issues involved.  One of those issues was privacy.  Not surprisingly the press coverage has glossed over this part of the report.

Chapter 7 of the Report reviews the privacy protections in place in Victoria (and Australia).  The Committee endorsed the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s recommendation to introduce a statutory right of privacy.  It relevantly stated:

Tragedies often make for rapid legislative response.  And usually dreadful policy.

The Independent reports in New data powers to access email and social media records would stop terrorists, says Philip Hammond that in the wake of the death of Drummer Lee Rigby last week the Government is considering giving police and security powers to access email and social media.

The article provides:

Proposed Read the rest of this entry »

The Privacy Amendment (Privacy Alerts) Bill 2013 was introduced into Parliament and read a second time today.  The homepage for the legislation is found here.  The Bill is found here (in PDF format).  The Explanatory Memorandum is found here.

The Second Reading Speech was moved.

Hot on the heels of the Attorney General’s announcement that a mandatory breach notification bill will be introduced into Parliament tomorrow the  Privacy Commissioner has issued a press released titled  Australians better protected with mandatory data breach notification.

It provides

The Australian Privacy Commissioner, Timothy Pilgrim, has welcomed the mandatory data breach notification laws announced by the Attorney-General the Hon Mark Dreyfus QC MP today. The proposed laws, to commence on 12 March 2014, require notification of serious data breaches that will result in a real risk of serious harm.

‘I have supported Read the rest of this entry »

The Attorney General held a press conference and issued a press release announcing the introduction into the Parliament of legislation requiring mandatory notification of data breaches which affect privacy.

The press release states:

PRIVACY ALERTS TO NOTIFY AUSTRALIANS OF DATA BREACHES

New laws to be introduced in Parliament tomorrow will require businesses and government agencies to notify people when a data breach affecting their privacy occurs.

“With businesses and government agencies holding more information about Australians than ever before, it is essential Read the rest of this entry »

Germany has strict privacy and surveillance laws. The country’s experience with dystopia in the form of the Nazi regime has bred a hypersensitivity to  any of its practices, even in a mild form.  It is therefore interesting to see the proposal by Deutsche Ban to test drones to collect evidenc of vandalism in  German railways to test anti-graffiti drones.

It provides:

Germany’s national railway company, Deutsche Bahn, plans to test small drones to try to reduce the amount of graffiti being sprayed on its property.

The idea is to use airborne infra-red cameras to collect evidence, Read the rest of this entry »