Facebook’s quasi-independent Oversight Board on May 5, 2021, upheld the company’s suspension of former President Donald Trump from the platform and Instagram. The decision came four months after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg banned Trump “indefinitely” for his role in inciting the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The board chastised Facebook for failing to… Read more »
Privacy-focused messaging app Signal has invoked the ire of Facebook after it created a series of advertisements designed to show Instagram users how their data is being used for micro-targeting. In a blog post this week, Signal’s head of growth Jun Harada said the app – owned by the non-profit Signal Foundation – found its ad-buying account… Read more »
The “significant market power” of the Apple App Store and Google Play in Australia needs to be addressed says Rod Sims, chair of competition regulator the ACCC, to give app developers better terms and conditions, as well as improving the approvals process The second part of the ACCC’s Digital Platform Services Inquiry interim report, which focuses… Read more »
More than nine out of ten parents think digital media and technologies are a negative distraction in their lives. And 83% think their children are also negatively distracted by digital devices. These are some of the findings from our Growing Up Digital Australia study. In 2020 we surveyed nearly 2,500 parents, grandparents and caregivers across… Read more »
The recent crash of a Tesla car in the United States, in which two people died, has reignited debate about the capabilities and safety of today’s “self-driving” technologies. Tesla cars include an “autopilot” feature which monitors surrounding traffic and lane markings, and the company is currently rolling out a more advanced “full self-driving” system which… Read more »
China’s state-run anti-monopoly bureau has tightened its regulations on big tech players, as shown by its recent move against the country’s largest e-commerce company, Alibaba Group. Alibaba was hit with a record antitrust fine of 18.2 billion yuan (more than A$3.6 billion) over the weekend for supposedly abusing its market dominance. The company, which operates… 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 »
Over the long weekend reports emerged of an alleged data breach, impacting half a billion Facebook users from 106 countries. And while this figure is staggering, there’s more to the story than 533 million sets of data. This breach once again highlights how many of the systems we use aren’t designed to adequately protect our… Read more »
Australian workplace tech powerhouses Atlassian and Culture Amp have been included in the top 10 for Fast Company’s annual list of the world’s most innovative companies. Unsurprising, project management tool Asana, Zoom and Slack take out the top three spots following a year where remote work and communication came to the fore, with Atlassian recognised… Read more »
Two startups have kicked major goals as they look to take their ideas global with help from ANSTO’s nandin Innovation Centre Amentum Aerospace is a software business that enables innovation in defence, aviation, space operations and research, and is now pitching to major European space agencies and airlines. The startup is being backed by the NSW Government,… Read more »
The fight between Epic Games, the company behind the wildly popular video game Fortnite, and tech giant Apple, which banned the company from its App store in August last year, is currently playing out in the Australian legal system, as well as the US, UK and Europe Last month Epic Games announced it had filed… Read more »
What’s the difference between Google and Facebook? One difference is that last week Google agreed to pay Australian news outlets for their content in the face of a threat of government action to force it to. Facebook did not, temporarily removing Australian news sources from its feeds, a decision it only reversed after winning a… Read more »
In denying news content to its Australian users, Facebook is arguably overplaying its hand, behaving as a big company that thinks it can intimidate governments. If it keeps doing this, it will ultimately lose customers, and that’s the last thing Facebook wants. Perhaps you’re already considering breaking up with Facebook, whether in reaction to the… Read more »
Facebook decided today that it became necessary to destroy the town to save it. Australians woke to news – but not on Facebook – that the trillion-dollar social media giant had banned the posting and sharing of news stories in their country. And it was worse than that when the algorithm the company deployed to… Read more »
If you’re reading this story, then you probably didn’t see it on Facebook. The social media giant announced overnight that it would ban Australian news media from its site, following through on a threat in response to the Australian government’s plans to force Google and Facebook to pay media companies for news featured on the… Read more »
Canva has a new $500 million shareholder – a Sydney private equity firm that previously made a fortune from pet food 
Outdoor adtech startup Doohly banks $500,000 pre-Seed to speed up digital ad execution 
Envato founders exit in $373 million Shutterstock deal 
Construction startup lands $2.9 million Series A for China push 
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