Mixed responses have greeted release of the National Human Rights Consultation Committee report, but the government is already watering down expectations of a Human Rights Act, saying that “enhanced education” and “improved parliamentary scrutiny” would…
DNA requires debate, legislationNew uses for DNA information are permeating Australia without debate about how we want to regulate either a useful guide to health or a tool to discrimate against people who – by accident of birth – are slightly different from whatever ‘average’ is.…
CLA is often asked about rights concerning drug tests in the workplace. Here two Australian academics discuss the usefulness of drug testing procedures and, among other issues, question whether mandatory testing can actually hide some problems that shoul…
Everything you own is suspect. With, say, $100,000 in assets, you have to prove you are not guilty of crime. Police – maybe using false identities – can go fishing in your tax files and your private bank records. As you try to fight to prove your inn…
Bruce Schneier, world techno futurologist, has keyed for the Japan Times this spot-on summary of where privacy is headed in the all-digital, all-knowing, all-is-revealed world of the future. (Note: Mixi is a Japanese social networking site). Read more »…
Crime continues to trend down, but wobbly politicians still play the vote-seeking ‘law and order’ card, reacting to rabid media beat-ups. The latest serious crime bill lowers the bar for prosecutors, doubly punishes those who have already served time for…
Any new health records system must safeguard a person’s ownership of their personal medical records, and their privacy from abuse or misuse of the information, CLA says in a submission to those designing the laws and rules around Australia’s new Health I…
As PM Kevin Rudd announced the first regional towns to get broadband would be in marginal seats in Tasmania, the Opposition was still being asked to pay almost $24,000 to find out – under freedom of information provisions – why and how the Government dec…
Confusion surrounds federal, state and public authority proposals for a national e-health system in Australia, critics say. As competing bodies propose varied systems, no-one is consulting with privacy and civil liberties groups to ensure people’s he…
A new audit examines the ‘state use of electronic technologies to record, organize, search and distribute forensic evidence against its citizens’. See how Australia and 51 other countries rank in this comparative analysis by a US data security firm. Rea…