Note: I have excluded (or marked out) any commentary taking significant funding from the Agency or the Department of Health on all this to avoid what amounts to paid propaganda. (e.g. CHF, RACGP, AMA, National Rural Health Alliance etc. where they were simply putting the ADHA line – viz. that the myHR is a wonderfully useful clinical development that will save huge numbers of lives at no risk to anyone – which is plainly untrue) (This signifies probable ADHA Propaganda)
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Note: I have also broadened this section to try to cover all the privacy and security compromising and impacting announcements in the week – along with the myHR. It never seems to stop!
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Australia an easy 'testing ground' for hackers: cyber industry chief
By David Wroe
March 9, 2019 — 11.50pm
Australia has become a “testing ground” for hackers trying new kinds of malicious software, partly because it has been slow to take cybersecurity seriously, the head of a government-funded science body has warned.
Michelle Price, chief executive of AustCyber, also said that as Australia plays a more assertive role in global affairs, it will be targeted more frequently by foreign-government-backed hackers. The recent hack of Parliament and the major political parties was an example of this.
A similar view was expressed by cyber security specialist Mike Sentonas of the firm CrowdStrike, which gained fame as one of the first companies to identify Russian hackers as responsible for the 2016 US election hack.
He said the firm’s research had shown Chinese cyber attacks on the US had increased as tensions between the countries rose, and it was possible the same would apply to Australia.
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What happened to common sense
Last week, at the final meeting of the My Health Record Expansion Program steering Group, we spoke about trust. Or better, the lack of trust people have in big databases, governments in general and many other institutions.
This global trend is described by psychologist professor Barry Schwartz, who says:
“(…) the disenchantment we experience as recipients of services is often matched by the dissatisfaction of those who provide them. Most doctors want to practice medicine as it should be practised. But they feel helpless faced with the challenge of balancing the needs and desires of patients with the practical demands of hassling with insurance companies, earning enough to pay malpractice premiums, and squeezing patients into seven-minute visits – all the while keeping up with the latest developments in their fields.
Schwartz says that we seem to respond to any problem with the same answer of sticks and carrots. There is a widespread belief that more and better rules and incentives will solve our woes. There is one issue. Rules and incentives deprive us of the opportunity to do the right thing. They undermine empathy, creativity and the will to figure out what moral right means.
The My Health record offers great opportunities for healthcare in Australia. However, even though 90.1% of Australians now have access to the My Health Record, this cannot be the end of the line. A system that is responsive, has means to listen to users and learn from errors and mistakes, is key to an effective and trustworthy digital health solution into the future.
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Check Point finds ultrasound machine trivial to hack
Astonishingly, having a device running Windows 2000 may not be a great idea
Check Point has warned that medical devices used by major healthcare providers could have gaping security holes, with researchers at the security firm revealing they were able to easily hack an ultrasound machine and retrieve and alter records stored on it.
Although ultrasound technology has “made huge advancements over recent years,” that hasn’t extended to their security, a Check Point blog entry said.
The device obtained by the researchers was based on Windows 2000 — extended support for the Microsoft operating system, which launched in early 2000, ended in July 2010.
Check Point was able not only able to access patient images stored on the machine but also alter the information displayed as well as infect it with ransomware thanks to a known Windows 2000 vulnerability.
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Treasury rejects privacy and ambiguity concerns over Consumer Data Right
The Australian government department responsible for the Consumer Data Right says there is sufficient consideration given to privacy and that the legislation isn't being rushed through.
The upcoming Consumer Data Right (CDR) will allow individuals to "own" their data by granting them open access to their banking, energy, phone, and internet transactions, as well as the right to control who can have it and who can use it.
The government is currently in the process of shaping the Treasury Laws Amendment (Consumer Data Right) Bill 2019, while the Senate Economics Legislation Committee simultaneously probes all involved parties on the progress of the legislation.
The inquiry saw a handful of submissions from interested parties, highlighting specific concerns over the adequacy of the privacy safeguards the CDR will contain, the rushed nature of the Bill, the distinct banking focus the Bill will have, and whether the outcome of the CDR will serve organisations more than it will consumers.
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The 3 Legs of the Health Informatics Standards Process
Posted on March 6, 2019 by Grahame Grieve
Lately, I’ve been describing the standards process that we’re engaged in – making a difference to people’s health through defining healthcare IT standards – as a process that has 3 legs. Kind of like this:
Well, not really. It’s actually 3 legs of a journey. The 3 legs are:
- Developing the base standards
- Profiling the standard for particular communities
- Driving Solutions into production in the market
#1 Developing the Base Standards
The first leg is developing the base standards the define the capabilities for describing and exchanging healthcare. These base standards enable all sorts of communities to form around exchanging healthcare data.
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Hospital pharmacists welcome policies
08/03/2019 ADHA Propaganda
The SHPA has welcomed comment on the “critical” importance of safely managing medicines for patients moving between the hospital and the home at APP on the Gold Coast yesterday
Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia Chief Executive Kristin Michaels says the election-year presentations by Health Minister Greg Hunt and Shadow Health Minister Catherine King at the Australian Pharmacy Professional conference cite many positive policies to improve safe, timely and equitable access to medicines for Australians.
Chief Executive Kristin Michaels says SHPA members have welcomed $10.5b investment into new and amended listings on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) in recent years.
“An increasing majority of new PBS listings are for complex diseases such as leukaemia, malignant melanoma and cystic fibrosis, medicines that are typically prescribed and dispensed for acutely unwell patients in the hospital setting by hospital pharmacists,” she says.
“Minister Hunt also noted 84% penetration of My Health Record into community pharmacies – this is a crucial step toward improving transitions of care, ideally linked to support for hospital pharmacists to upload information on discharge and supply of discharge medicines, ensuring GPs and other community care providers are empowered to provide informed, quality care.”
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Healthcare faces challenges in accessing patient records
Hafizah Osman | 08 Mar 2019
GPs, specialists and hospital staff are said to be facing challenges in accessing patient records from other practitioners, resulting in unnecessary medical tests, treatments or procedures performed.
In a study by Choosing Wisely Australia, it was found that 54 per cent of GPs, 61 per cent of specialists and 36 per cent of health service providers said difficulties accessing information from doctors in other settings, including results, was a key reason for requesting unnecessary healthcare.
The 2018 Choosing Wisely Australia Report: Conversations for change study also identified that health professionals said patient expectations, potential for medical litigation and uncertainty of diagnosis are common factors for low-value healthcare.
NPS MedicineWise CEO Steve Morris said moving forward, there is a need to reduce unnecessary tests, treatments and procedures, especially in primary and specialist care and in hospitals.
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WebAuthn: What you need to know about the future of the passwordless Web
While OS and browser makers now support the WebAuthn API, it's unclear when and how Web sites will begin implementing it.
Mark Hachman (PC World (US online))07 March, 2019 22:00
WebAuthn is a new way of logging into websites that may finally free you from remembering passwords. Instead, you’ll use you: your fingerprint or face, or a hardware token.
The WebAuthn API is now an official standard, ratified by the World Wide Web Consortium (or W3C) on Monday. Fortunately, it’s already been built into many popular browsers as well as Windows 10. Now it’s up to the web itself to incorporate it. Here’s how it will work.
What makes WebAuthn better?
You may have heard of the Collections data breaches: millions of usernames and passwords, some linked to one another, and published to the web. In part, that’s because websites currently ask you to log in and store a username and password within the site itself. If that data leaks publicly, then bad actors can use that information to see whether you’ve used the passwords elsewhere. That can lead to a cascade effect, where hackers gain access to more and more of your personal information.
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Why Aussies will be left out of Facebook's privacy promise
Updated Mar 7, 2019 — 4.32pm, first published at 4.08pm
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has promised Facebook users heightened privacy protection as the social media platform pivots towards encrypted private messaging. But concerns have been raised that Australians will be left out because of controversial anti-encryption laws.
In a blog post on Thursday, Zuckerberg announced Facebook will become a "privacy-focused platform" with end-to-end encryption and give users control over how long their information is stored.
"I believe the future of communication will increasingly shift to private, encrypted services where people can be confident what they say to each other stays secure and their messages and content won't stick around forever," Zuckerberg wrote.
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Zuckerberg promises a privacy-friendly Facebook, sort of
Michael Liedtke
Updated Mar 7, 2019 — 10.34am, first published at 10.27am
San Francisco | Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook would start to emphasise new privacy-shielding messaging services, a shift apparently intended to blunt both criticism of the company's data handling and potential antitrust action.
In effect, the Facebook co-founder and CEO promised to transform a service known for devouring the personal information shared by its users. Going forward, he said, it will emphasise giving people more ways to communicate in truly private fashion, with their intimate thoughts and pictures shielded by encryption in ways that Facebook itself can't read.
But Zuckerberg didn't suggest any changes to Facebook's core newsfeed- and groups-based service, or to Instagram's social network, currently the fastest growing part of the company. Facebook pulls in gargantuan profits by selling ads targeted with the information it amasses on its users and others they know.
"It's not that I think the more public tools will go away," Zuckerberg said in an interview with The Associated Press. "All indications that Facebook and Instagram will continue growing and be increasingly important."
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Facebook rejects Australian regulator's push for scrutiny of news feeds
By Tom Westbrook on Mar 7, 2019 6:39AM
Like Google, denies market power.
Facebook Inc has rejected an Australian regulator's recommendation for greater scrutiny over the social network's advertising market power and the ranking of news articles in customers' feeds.
The proposal by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) in December, along with a new regulator to police technology giants, is being watched closely in other countries as governments seek to check their power.
"People, not regulators, should decide what they see in their news feeds," Facebook said in a 76-page submission in reply dated March 3 and emailed to Reuters on Wednesday.
"Creating a news ranking regulator for Facebook is not a proportionate regulatory solution that will be effective to address the longstanding monetisation challenges facing some Australian publishers," Facebook said.
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Two-factor authentication SMS codes aren't your best option for cyber security
By Mike Johnstone
When it comes to personal cybersecurity, you might think you're doing alright.
Maybe you've got multi-factor authentication set up on your phone so that you have to enter a code sent to you by SMS before you can log in to your email or bank account from a new device.
What you might not realise is that new scams have made authentication using a code sent by SMS messages, emails or voice calls less secure than they used to be.
Multi-factor authentication is listed in the Australian Cyber Security Centre's Essential Eight Maturity Model as a recommended security measure for businesses to reduce their risk of cyber attack.
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Would you consider donating your data to healthcare?
Michelle Gallaher
- 3:38PM March 5, 2019
It is clear that many of us don’t feel like we are in charge of our data. We don’t know how to access the data we have created, and we are becoming increasingly concerned about who has access to it and how it will be used. And it is no wonder. Many apps, wearables, social media platforms and websites will say they have our consent, but it is typically not dynamic consent and rarely is it truly informed.
As we enter a new era of data rights, technology platforms that capture data and store it must be compliant with the changing regulations and legislation coming into force around the world, ensuring consumers are protected and their data is secure and private. This poses an interesting question around who owns the data we generate and how it can be used and by whom.
A lesser known fact when it comes to the conversation around data, is the huge value it holds to potentially transform medical research within the healthcare sector; and it goes without saying that informed consent is absolutely critical in sharing any health-related data.
Bioinformatics is an interdisciplinary field the brings together biologists, mathematicians, computer scientists and statisticians to develop methods and software tools to understand biological data that has been captured in tissue samples, clinical information created and stored in hospitals and data from experiments in research laboratories around the world, for example. It’s a relatively new field of research that became prominent around 2007, hailed as a ‘revolution’ in fast-tracking drug and clinical discovery. Bioinformatics is the art and science of asking the right questions with the right data and it has played a significant role in delivering powerful information and insight into diseases, how they develop and how we might treat them.
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Facebook concerned by ACCC recommendations
Facebook doesn't want Australians' news consumption monitored by a government regulator, as suggested in a preliminary report into digital platforms.
Australian Associated Press March 6, 201910:04am
Facebook has serious concerns about the competition watchdog proposed's "news ranking regulator", fearing it could disrupt Australians' newsfeeds.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in December released its preliminary report on a world-first inquiry into the impact digital platforms are having locally and recommended a regulatory authority be given the power to "monitor, investigate and report" on the ranking of news and advertising on digital platforms.
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Time to review endpoint security: Trend Micro exec
- 05 March 2019
- Written by Stephen Withers
Changes in the threat landscape mean organisations should take a fresh look at their endpoint security measures, Trend Micro global vice-president of market strategy Eric Skinner has told iTWire.
Fileless malware represents "a rapid evolution in the threat landscape" and its incidence increased by 819% between August 2017 and December 2018, Skinner observed.
One reason for the rapid increase in fileless malware was because most organisations had managed to get ransomware under control, so "the attackers have shifted to something new".
The technique generally involves using legitimate software such as PowerShell to perform unauthorised actions on victim systems. This makes it effectively invisible to older types of endpoint security software, he said.
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The women’s health tech boom: How private is my period data?
Monday 4 March 2019 5:52PM (view full episode)
It's a growing multi-million-dollar market: more and more women are using apps to track their menstrual cycles and fitness bands to monitor their health.
They're handing over a lot of very sensitive information in the process, and questions are being raised about privacy and data collection — not to mention the industry's health claims.
Guests:
Ariel Bogle
Online Technology Reporter, ABC Science Unit
Host:
Olivia Willis
Producer:
James Bullen
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AIIA urges govt not to stuff up CDR regulatory framework
- 05 March 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
The Australian Information Industry Association says its members are opposed to the imposition of a template for the proposed consumer data rights regulatory framework that is designed to suit the banking and energy sectors.
In a statement, the advocacy group called on the Federal Government to work with industry and consumers to draft the proposed framework.
The CDR Bill 2019 is meant to create an extensive regulatory framework for sharing consumer data across industry sectors. It was introduced into the House of Representatives in February and referred to the Senate Economics and Legislation Committee for inquiry and a report by 18 March.
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Why quantum computing is a geopolitical race for business and national security
Mar 4, 2019 — 11.00pm
At one level – the microphysical one – everything about quantum computing is very small. At another – the geopolitical – it's just the opposite: the implications are very large indeed.
In the not-too-distant future, the processing power of computers will be orders of magnitude faster than we know now. So we were told in an old lecture theatre off the main quadrangle of the University of Sydney.
The Q Forum discussion was told humankind is on the cusp of a truly transformational technology. The coterie of world-leading political science professors also explained why the race to build the first quantum computer is not merely a scientific one, but highly political as well.
This isn't the first time the world has been in a race for quantum supremacy. Then, the situation ended badly.
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Google claims it has no market power in online search or advertising
- 05 March 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
Google has rejected the preliminary findings of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's digital platforms inquiry, saying there is no need for any regulatory body to oversee its functioning and claiming that it does not have any market power in search and advertising online.
In a submission in response to the ACCC's preliminary findings, the search giant said on Monday that the report was based on the "mistaken premise" that it had market power in search, search advertising and referrals to different media.
Rather, it competed for users by providing "high-quality search results", the company claimed. "Google is just one among many sources of traffic to news sites. Direct navigation by consumers to news sites is the largest source of traffic," it added.
As far as search advertising went, the submission said the preliminary report was wrong to conclude that Google is not restricted by other forms of advertising. "Google faces competition from many sources including thousands of search, travel, e-commerce, and publisher sites along with other forms of online and offline advertising," it said.
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Google rejects ACCC call for scrutiny, denies market power
By Staff Writer on Mar 5, 2019 12:14AM
Denies it enjoys market power.
Google has rejected calls by Australia's competition regulator for tougher scrutiny of its operations, denying that it enjoys market power in online searches and advertising, documents published on Monday showed.
The global giant was responding to recommendations made late last year by the watchdog, such as increased scrutiny and a new regulatory body to monitor the dominance of tech giants in online advertising and news markets.
"The preliminary report bases many of its recommendations on the mistaken premise that Google has market power in search, search advertising, and news media referrals," Google wrote in a Feb. 18 statement published by the regulator.
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Collaboration is a key part of health systems today: panel
Hafizah Osman | 04 Mar 2019
The rise of digital technology and the availability of data means that it’s now within the reach for consumers to be critical enablers of change in the healthcare system, a panel of industry experts said.
Speaking at the recent AFR Healthcare Summit, Queensland Health Director-General Michael Walsh said a stronger focus on the consumer will improve the quality and safety of healthcare in Australia, and support a more sustainable local healthcare system.
“Consumers are increasingly becoming activated to drive transformation and innovation in healthcare. As with other sectors, it is the consumer experience that counts the most; not the product or device. It is how the life and health of the consumer is enhanced, that will be the true measure of success,” he said.
“Digital health allows the information asymmetry to be more equalised. As a steward of a large public health system, I’m acutely aware of the need to listen and foster this driving force.”
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Diversity the antidote to AI bias
- By Sue Shellenbarger
- The Wall Street Journal
- 1:00AM March 2, 2019
Artificial intelligence isn’t always intelligent enough at the office.
One major company built a job-applicant screening program that automatically rejected most women’s resumes. Others developed facial-recognition algorithms that mistook many black women for men.
The expanding use of AI is attracting new attention to the importance of workforce diversity. Although tech companies have stepped up efforts to recruit women and minorities, computer and software professionals who write AI programs are still largely white and male, US Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows.
Developers testing their products often rely on data sets that lack adequate representation of women or minority groups. One widely used data set is more than 74 per cent male and 83 per cent white, research shows. Thus, when engineers test algorithms on these databases with high numbers of people like themselves, they may work fine.
The risk of building the resulting blind spots or biases into tech products multiplies exponentially with AI, damaging customers’ trust and cutting into profit. And the benefits of getting it right expand as well, creating big winners and losers.
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Facebook lobbied govts for lax privacy laws: claim
- 04 March 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
Leaked internal Facebook documents show that the company was targeting politicians in a number of countries, promising them investments and incentives in exchange for pushing against privacy laws on the social media giant's behalf.
The documents are said to come from a case filed in California against Facebook by the application developer Six4Three, the same company from which the British Parliament seized documents in November last year.
The Guardian reported on Sunday that the leaked files showed Facebook was involved in lobbying lawmakers and regulators in the US, Canada, India, Vietnam, Brazil, Argentina, Malaysia and the EU.
No link was mentioned between the documents seized in November and the current crop. Britain's culture, media and sport committee chairman Damian Collins was at the heart of the move to seize the documents in November.
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Nine backs ACCC-run regulatory regime for digital platforms
- 04 March 2019
- Written by Sam Varghese
Nine Entertainment has called for a regime to regulate dominant digital platforms — aka Google and Facebook — which would be administered by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, and new powers for the competition watchdog to issue rules in order to encourage more competition.
In a submission in response to the ACCC's preliminary digital platforms inquiry report, Nine also said the introduction of a tax offset for news and a personal tax deduction for subscriptions would help address the level of production of news and journalistic content in the country.
The ACCC, in its preliminary report, said it had concluded that Google had substantial market power in online search, search advertising and news referral while Facebook had similar clout in markets for social media, display advertising and online news referral.
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Comments welcome!
David.
The Doctorsbag (2nd story) is interesting. I would add that it is (in the case of MyHR) that the government is not trusted to own and operate such systems. They should stick with what Governments are enshrined to do. I trust them in a lot of areas. By expanding into areas outside the governments purpose all they do is build mistrust with the public and infect themselves with inderviduals that leave trails of destruction as they hover up rewards and take unsuspecting and ill-equipped public servants for a ride. We are seeing the results emerge as the very structure of our systems start to crumble and we have a major uphill battle to rebuild these institutions.
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