Brandon How

The Western Australian parliament has been forced to consider changes to a signature public sector privacy and data sharing bill, amid criticisms it delivers "privacy lite" protections. The amendments - brought by independent Legislative Council member Wilson Tucker - would bring the bill closer to the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation. The Privacy and Responsible Information Sharing (PRIS) bill is scheduled for debate on Tuesday, but given the government's majority in the upper and lower houses, the amendments are unlikely to pass. Mr Tucker told InnovationAus “this is the one shot for WA to get these laws right”, to ensure visibility and transparency regarding the government's use of personal data.

The federal government's broad definition of an Australian business is hurting the country’s economic complexity, a group of local defence, technology and space companies collectively worth more than $5 billion have warned. In a submission to a consultation on what makes an Australian business, the Sovereign Australian Prime Alliance (SAPA) said that including multinational subsidiaries in the definition diminishes the effectiveness of policy aimed at uplifting Australia’s industrial capability. The group consisting of NIOA, DroneShield, Macquarie Technology Group, AUSTAL and Gilmour Space argued that subsidiaries of foreign-owned multinationals “are necessarily vested in advancing the industrial capabilities of their home nations first and foremost”.

Social media companies failing to fight scams on their platforms will be subject to fines of up to $50 million under a new framework brought before Parliament on Thursday. Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones has put social media companies “on notice”, with the proposed legislation to enable sector-specific mandatory scam codes and require consumers to have easy access to an internal dispute resolution mechanism. The government has also committed to building a “a mandatory coordinated intelligence sharing ecosystem that requires timely reporting and information sharing across industry and government”, if the legislation passes.

Attempts to use stolen identity credentials legitimately spiked by 66 per cent in just seven months, with federal government's anti-fraud register blocking more than 200,00 attempts by fraudsters.The Credential Protection Register was created following the Optus data breach in October 2022 to prevent compromised passports, Medicare cards and driver’s licence data from being verified through the government’s Document Verification Service (DVS).Initially established by the Department of Home Affairs to block the use of credentials stolen from more than 2.1 million Optus customers while new identity documents were issued, it is now overseen by the Attorney-General’s Department.

Australia’s leading constitutional law expert Anne Twomey is says there is a potential "constitutional problem" with the government's definition of misinformation and serious harm in proposed laws. Appearing before a Senate inquiry into the Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation Bill on Monday, Ms Twomey said examples in the explanatory memorandum could capture political communication, which is an implied constitutional freedom. But the Sydney University Professor Emerita argued that the definitions in the text of the bill, which she expressed no particular concern with, is “completely different” with the explanatory memorandum making it “all very confusing”. She also expressed concerns around the practicality of identifying mis- and disinformation on foreign-based social media platforms, noting that "outsourcing censorship to foreign corporations generally, is not a good idea".

Tweaks to Consumer Data Right rules effective from Tuesday allow energy companies to shield their trial products for two years from the scheme's data sharing obligations in a bid to encourage more innovation. The longer than expected exemption was announced alongside streamlined consent and data collection processes by Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones as part of his "reset" of the economy wide data sharing scheme. The energy sector's trial product exemption applies to new products being rolled out to up to 2,000 customers and will last 24 months. It is double the current thresholds for CDR's pioneer banking sector but still well below what energy companies had asked for.

Science and Technology Australia’s next president will be ocean governance expert Jasmine Chambers, who will take over from Sharath Sriram in November 2025. Ms Chambers has been on the board of the representative group for scientists and technologists since 2018 and will serve as president-elect over the next 12 months. Her appointment comes two months after settling a unfair dismissal case against the Bureau of Meteorology, which made her redundant after she took personal leave ahead of a Paris conference.

The Western Australian government has dismissed calls from a parliamentary committee to appoint a chief entrepreneur a couple months after appointing its inaugural Innovation Advisory Board. The state government said “the merits in exploring this recommendation will be proposed for discussion at future [Innovation Advisory Board] meeting” in its response to the Public Administration Committee’s recommendations on Tuesday. The 11-member advisory board has “diverse representation across the Innovation ecosystem” and will be responsible for giving government “key innovation insights and oversight of progress against the WA Innovation Strategy’s vision and goals”, according to the state government.

The Victorian government will roll out a statewide electronic medical record across all hospitals and health services, streamlining access to patient information and replacing paper-based systems. Health minister Mary-Anne Thomas announced the initiative on Thursday, pledging $21.4 million to support the planning and implementation of the system at more than 25 of the state's 76 health services. Delivery of the “connected and standardised” system, which will move with patients “regardless of the hospital they’re being treated at”, will be led by Hospitals Victoria and the state's Department of Health.

The Australian Industry and Defence Network’s chief executive Brent Clark has stepped down from the role after almost half a decade of lobbying for smaller suppliers. Mr Clark took the helm of the Defence industry association in 2020, bringing with him experience from working at Thales, BAE Systems, French multinational Naval Group, and the Defence Teaming Centre, a South Australian defence industry association. In a statement to InnovationAus, Mr Clark said the Australian Industry and Defence Network chief executive role “is a rare privilege” and the responsibility of advocating for the small to medium sized business community should “never be underestimated”.