Legal action by the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission against Google over changes to its data privacy policy has been dismissed by the Federal Court in a big win for the US tech company. The court found that Google did not mislead Australian consumers when it changed its privacy policy to expand the scope of… Read more »
By now, most of us are aware social media companies collect vast amounts of our information. By doing this, they can target us with ads and monetise our attention. The latest chapter in the data-privacy debate concerns one of the world’s most popular apps among young people – TikTok. Yet anecdotally it seems the potential… Read more »
When English statesman Sir Francis Bacon famously said “knowledge is power”, he could hardly have foreseen the rise of ubiquitous social media some 500 years later. Yet social media platforms are some of the world’s most powerful businesses – not least because they can collect massive amounts of user data, and use algorithms to turn… Read more »
Well-known Australian retailers are using facial recognition technology to identify customers who enter selected stores, an investigation by consumer advocacy group CHOICE has found. Hardware giant Bunnings, Kmart and The Good Guys are capturing facial recognition data. CHOICE asked 25 Australian retailers whether they use facial recognition technology, and analysed their privacy policies. Those three… Read more »
Schools’ use of educational technologies (edtech) grew exponentially at the height of COVID lockdowns. A recent Human Rights Watch (HRW) report has exposed children’s rights violations by providers of edtech endorsed by governments in Australia and overseas. The lockdowns have ended but edtech remains embedded in education. Children will have to navigate issues of data… Read more »
Google collects more personal data about its users than any other big tech company, an analysis has found just days after Facebook petitioned the ACCC for an exemption from regulation because Apple’s privacy crackdown is costing it money and market share. A deep analysis of the voluminous privacy policies of Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, and Google by… Read more »
Consumers using online retail marketplaces such as eBay and Amazon “have little effective choice in the amount of data they share”, according to the latest report of the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) Digital Platform Services Inquiry. Consumers may benefit from personalisation and recommendations in these marketplaces based on their data, but many are… Read more »
Brisbane startup DataBench has appointed its first external CEO with founder David Christmas handing over the reins veteran tech exec Paul Muller. Muller has been an advisor to the automated data privacy platform’s board for the past nine months and has previously been a C-suite exec for the likes of VMWare, SAP, Oracle, Solnet and… Read more »
An Australian software developer has accused Australian border authorities of abusing their power to search his phone when returning home from a recent holiday. Taking to Reddit to share his experience with others, the traveller, James, says he has concerns that the Customs Act allows officers at the border to force people to hand over… Read more »
State, territory, and federal governments have agreed to the first national data sharing program that will ease the movement of data between jurisdictions. The formation of the Australian Data Network follows an intergovernmental data sharing agreement signed by the National Cabinet in early July which commits Australian state, territorial and federal governments to share data with one… Read more »
The proliferation of child sexual abuse material on the internet is harrowing and sobering. Technology companies send tens of millions of reports per year of these images to the nonprofit National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The way companies that provide cloud storage for your images usually detect child abuse material leaves you vulnerable… Read more »
Have you ever chatted with a friend about buying a certain item and been targeted with an ad for that same item the next day? If so, you may have wondered whether your smartphone was “listening” to you. But is it really? Well, it’s no coincidence the item you’d been interested in was the same… Read more »
Google and Google Australia misled consumers about its use of personal location data, according to Australia’s Federal Court in a landmark legal decision. Consumer watchdog the ACCC took Google to court in October 2019 over the use of location data collected through Android mobile devices between January 2017 and December 2018, in a world-first enforcement… Read more »
Most people these days are aware that what they share online is both valuable and vulnerable. Data privacy has become a major concern for consumers and corporations alike. The issue will come to a head when New Zealand’s Privacy Act 2020 comes into force on December 1. The legislation replaces and updates the 1993 act.… Read more »
Atlassian boss Mike Cannon-Brookes and Square Peg Capital’s Paul Bassat are among the tech sector’s high-profile supporters of the federal government’s contact-tracing smartphone app, CovidSafe, released on Sunday, but many remain wary of letting politicians anywhere near their data amid ongoing suspicion of their motives. Cannon-Brookes came out in favour of the app, which… Read more »
Atlassian shares plunge after another quarterly loss
We asked ChatGPT to explain 9 epic startup failures, including FTX & Fast, to VC investors – and most of the answers are bullshi… er, bullish
Workplace coaching platform Fingerprint for Success raises $6.5 million
Quantum startup Q-CTRL lands $39 million in Series B top up led by Salesforce Ventures
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