Season’s Greetings, dear readers! It is almost time to start winding down, take a break … and then before the champagne has entirely worn off no doubt you will be taking stock, and planning ahead. (Well, OK, maybe after a few days of restful time at…
Archives for 2016
Social licence and pragmatic tools: how to unlock public data
So November has been quite the month for discussing big ideas about Big Data. Between the iappANZ ‘Trust in Privacy’ Summit, the Privacy Commissioner’s De-identification Workshop, and the Productivity Commission’s draft report into Data Availability a…
Dear Diary: Should you be public or private, personal or Ministerial?
I had a dream last night – well, more of a nightmare really. I dreamt that my home had been burgled. As I walked through my home, seeing possessions flung about but nothing obviously missing, I was thinking: what is there to steal anymore anyway? No-…
Individuation – Re-thinking the scope of privacy laws
In Australia, our information privacy rights turn on the definition of ‘personal information’. If data meets the definition of ‘personal information’, there will be privacy obligations attached to it; otherwise, all bets are off. But is this approach…
Why I’m taking leave of my Census: a privacy expert’s reluctant boycott
Dear Magistrate, In case the ABS is prosecuting me for non-completion of this year’s Census, I thought I should explain to you my reasons why I have decided that a boycott is the only moral position I can take. The short version is this: Yes to a nati…
What’s in the bag: data analytics or social surveillance?
If de-identification is the new black, then data analytics is the new ‘it’ black handbag: trendy, sexy despite its increasing ubiquity, and capable of holding – and hiding – anything. It’s the opacity of the data analytics handbag that has me worried….
Magic and rocket science: de-identification is the new black
De-identification … it’s the latest buzzword. With all the press it’s been getting recently, you could be forgiven for thinking that de-identification is the magic solution to all the privacy problems facing open data and Big Data projects. But like o…
Woolly thinking & knotty problems: how to untangle the Disclosure rules
I think our privacy laws are too tough. (Collective gasp! An avowed champion of privacy rights thinks the laws are too tough??) Wait! No! I should clarify, before you think I have lost my mind and gone over to the dark side. No, I think our laws ar…
Cash for data? Ownership of personal information not a solution
World Wide Web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee has given a speech in London, re-affirming the importance of privacy, but unfortunately he has muddied the waters by casting aspersions on privacy law. Berners-Lee makes a technologist’s error, calling for un…
Why you might want to become a Jedi Knight for this year’s Census
In the week before Christmas last year, the Australian Bureau of Statistics quietly trashed your privacy. We have only a few months to claim it back. In December 2015, the ABS announced its plans to collect and keep the name and address of every person…
Will the new Transborder principle become an April fool’s joke?
On 1 April, a new Transborder Disclosure principle will commence in NSW. The revised section 19(2) of the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (NSW) (PPIPA), will – if it is interpreted the correct way – raise the bar when public sector…
How Stephanie’s broken down car is undermining your privacy
We need to talk about Ben. Specifically, about Ben Grubb, the tech journo who triggered an on-going legal case, the resolution of which might yet either reinforce or undermine Australia’s privacy laws. (We’ll get onto Stephanie and her troublesome car…
Find your friends … and then invade their privacy
The highest court in Germany has ruled that Facebook’s “Find Friends” function is unlawful there. The decision is the culmination of legal action started in 2010 by German consumer groups, and confirms the rulings of other lower courts in 2012 and 2014…
