The government has agreed to proposals that would allow Australians to opt out of targeted advertising, require search engines to "de-index" certain information about them, and draw small businesses into Australia's privacy scheme.
Sounds great, but knowing something about how screwed Australians are for privacy I'm sure there's a caveat. Probably have to have a digital ID 100% verifiable human citizen before you can use it. Allow yourself to be AI tracked online and off 24/7 to get rid of some ads. If people did a bit of research you will find you can already do these things and more to increase your security and protect your own privacy. The governments don't like that though. If it's something like the EU's GDPR with no caveats then it will be an improvement.
Its the Australian government there's going to be so many loopholes that its essentially pointless then when people ask for a real version they gonna point to it and go look we already have this stop complaining.
Very important legal distinction here: we have laws about spying on our own citizens, so we let our allies do it for us, while we openly spy on our allies citizens, and then share that information back with each other. Totally different bro! /s
That's already illegal. Australian Privacy Principle #3 states:
an organisation, may only collect this information where it is reasonably necessary for the organisation’s functions or activities
In other words, they can't collect it unless it is necessary to provide service they offer.
I have lived and breathed (and trained hundreds of people on) these privacy principles. Our privacy laws are already pretty good. Waaaaay better than the USA. But yeah, they're due for a bit of modernisation.
The "right to be forgotten" should not be looked at as a good thing. Its reason for existing is honestly pretty gross. It's about censoring people's access to news if the subject of that news doesn't like it. Literally, Google v Costeja is basically its origin, and it's a case where Google was forced to stop linking to news articles about a person despite those articles being entirely accurate. This is bad for two reasons:
First, the news is accurate. It reported on events that had occurred—in fact, the reporting was legally mandated by the Spanish Government. This was not in dispute. Access to accurate information simply because it portrays someone in a bad light is an awful kind of censorship.
Second, it went after the wrong subject. Google's job is to link people to websites. If someone wants information taken down, they shouldn't be asking Google to de-index it, they should be going after the news site. If the law wants to allow the information to be made inaccessible, they should require the news site to take it down. Or better, they should be required to issue an update or retraction alongside the previously-accurate article.
Social media companies follow us wherever we go online (and occasionally offline), learning intimate details they can use to target advertising.
Millions of Australians have been implicated in data breaches compromising passport details, health information or other sensitive communications held onto long past when was reasonable.
Now, the federal government has committed to overhauling Australia's privacy laws following the recommendations of a major review first initiated by the former administration.
Among the proposals the government has tentatively agreed to is also the idea that individuals should have the right to require an entity to delete or de-identify their personal information.
The government agrees in-principle that people should have that right, including being able to require search engines to de-index certain information about them, meaning it would not show in their results.
The government has flagged it will continue working on the reforms into next year, with fresh rounds of consultation to come for some of the most complex proposals, as well as likely transition periods for those affected.
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