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This weekly blog is to explore the larger issues around Digital Health, data security, data privacy, AI / ML. technology, social media and related matters.
I will also try to highlight ADHA Propaganda when I come upon it.
Just so we keep count, the latest Notes from the ADHA Board are dated 6 December, 2018! Secrecy unconstrained! This is really the behaviour of a federal public agency gone rogue – and it just goes on! When you read this it will be over 14 months of radio silence, and worse, while the CEO, COO and the Chief of Staff have gone, still no change. I wonder will things improve at some point – so far seems not?
Note: Appearance here is not to suggest I see any credibility or value in what follows. I will leave it to the reader to decide what is worthwhile and what is not! The point is to let people know what is being said / published that I have come upon.
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The future of banking: this is what ‘digital transformation’ really means
Recently, Oliver Wyman, a global management consulting firm, released its annual report on The State of the Financial Services Industry 2020 in which it discussed the ‘mindset collision’ as a significant modern challenge faced by financial institutions. The ‘mindset collision’ refers to the “the desire to reimagine the business for the long-term and the need to remain disciplined and profitable in the short-term” – in other words, how to transform sustainably.
A key finding of the report was that only25 per cent of investors are confident digital transformation strategies will be effective in financial institutions. The phrase ‘digital transformation’ has become an overused umbrella term for what really describes innovation – something that many established organisations in the sector are yet to properly understand – thereby creating a sense of jargon fatigue among stakeholders and consumers alike.
The findings also reveal that in the first half of 2019, European banks mentioned ‘digital’ in 98 per cent of their external communications, compared to only 27 per cent in research analyst reports. This points to a strong disconnect that does not yield tangible results for organisations. In order to remain compliant and profitable, the banking sector must enter the 21st Century and rid the legacy mindset that past success automatically translates into future prosperity.
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Cops are getting full URLs under Australia's data retention scheme
There is content on the envelope. A Senate committee has been told that law enforcement agencies sometimes get full URLs from telcos, despite government reassurances.
The Commonwealth Ombudsman, Michael Manthorpe, has revealed that law enforcement agencies are being given the full URLs of web pages visited by people under investigation.
Australia's mandatory telecommunications data retention scheme was meant to deliver only so-called "metadata" to the cops and spooks. Under the scheme, a warrant is not required.
But according to Manthorpe, the "ambiguity around the definition of content" means that agencies might effectively be receiving the content of communications.
The ombudsman explained his concerns during a hearing of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security (PJCIS) on Friday.
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‘It’s an arms race against the worst of the worst’
A torrent of online child sexual abuse and exploitation material could turn into a tsunami. Julie Inman Grant is on a mission to civilise cyberspace.
By Stephen Lunn
· From The Weekend Australian Magazine
February 7, 2020
First you hear a car coming to a stop. Then you see a child’s face appear on the screen. It’s clear she’s in the back seat, recording the video on her phone. You hear the brakes engage and the handbrake pulled. Two women get out of the front seats. One says, “We’ll be back in a sec, sweetie.” The doors slam shut, and then you hear the child saying to a person on the other end of the phone, “What do you want me to do?”
Toby Dagg, head of a team of cyber investigators working in the office of Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, is describing one online video he can’t erase from his mind. Among the thousands of appalling images he has witnessed in his eight years in the job, he can’t shake this one. “The person is obviously conveying instructions to the girl in some way we can’t see, likely by text,” he says. “They direct her to an adult pornographic website on her phone, and then say something along the lines of: ‘Like that.’ She turns her phone’s camera towards her genital area, pulls aside her underpants and films herself. She quickly rearranges herself as the two adults come back to the car, get in and drive off. She would have been six or seven years old. The whole thing took no more than 30 seconds.”
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Australian companies are getting hack ready
Feb 8, 2020 — 12.00am
A consumer cannot decide between two TVs with similar prices, specifications and energy efficiency, so buys the first one because it has a higher cyber security rating.
Concerned about a cyber criminal hacking into the smart TV – and spying on his family – he carefully considers the cyber safety ratings. Each TV has an independent cyber security score shown by a sticker on the screen, similar to health or energy-efficiency star ratings.
“It is inevitable that connected devices will have cyber security ratings within five years,” says Damien Manuel, chairman of the Australian Information Security Association (ASIA). “A device’s cyber security rating will become a key part of the consumer decision-making process.”
Manuel’s prediction is a glimpse of what is ahead as cyber security ratchets up the list of priorities for consumers, companies and governments.
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RACGP WEBINAR: My Health Record
In January 2019 My Health Record, Australia's shared electronic health record system, moved to an opt-out model. This resulted in every Australian known to Medicare or the Department of Veterans Affairs having a My Health Record created unless they opted out.
Join us, one year on, as we provide an overview and update on the system, discuss the impact of the transition to an opt-out model for general practice, outline system changes that have occurred since the transition, and what your practice needs to consider if participating in My Health Record.
Presented by Dr Rob Hosking, Chair of the RACGP Expert Committee - Practice Technology and Management (PTM) and the RACGP PTM team.
This education is a CPD Activity worth two points under the RACGP CPD Program.
To reigister, click here.
Join us, one year on, as we provide an overview and update on the system, discuss the impact of the transition to an opt-out model for general practice, outline system changes that have occurred since the transition, and what your practice needs to consider if participating in My Health Record.
Presented by Dr Rob Hosking, Chair of the RACGP Expert Committee - Practice Technology and Management (PTM) and the RACGP PTM team.
This education is a CPD Activity worth two points under the RACGP CPD Program.
To reigister, click here.
Thursday 27 February, 2020 - 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Location: Online
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Facebook’s plan to encrypt platforms ‘puts children at risk’
Australian child protection groups have joined counterparts from across the world to sign an open letter to Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg, urging him not to proceed with the introduction of end-to-end encryption across all its platforms, including the popular Messenger application.
The groups, including Bravehearts, the Child Abuse Prevention Service and the Carly Ryan Foundation, are among 128 signatories to the letter, which warns that the encryption decision would lead to “more serious and sustained sexual abuse”.
The letter says the change would embolden abusers to “initiate and escalate abuse on Facebook’s services”, presenting an unacceptable risk to children.
“We urge you to recognise and accept that an increased risk of child abuse being facilitated on or by Facebook is not a reasonable trade-off to make,” it says.
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How smart does a toothbrush need to be?
By Alice Clarke
February 6, 2020 — 12.45pm
Having non-rotten teeth is one of life’s little pleasures that few are willing to give up. But what does a $400+ smart toothbrush offer that a $3 dumb one doesn’t? And what do dentists have to say about all this?
The Oral-B AI 10000 is smart, but not necessarily much better than any other toothbrush.
At the CES gadget show this year, it was remarkable just how many vendors were promoting tooth tech with more bells and whistles than you could poke a diamond grill at. I used a new Oral B model that had an accelerometer and gyroscope built in to better tell where it was in your mouth, so you could keep records of how you brushed your teeth. That’s not due on sale until much later in the year, but out now is the $500 Oral-B Genius AI 10000 that does a similar job with fewer sensors.
It’s a sleek-looking brush with an indicator light at the top to show if you’re pushing too hard, and lights for the five different brush modes. Once you’re done with the included heads, a replacement two-pack will set you back a little more than $10.
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Consumer data rights will create security weaknesses, experts say
Feb 6, 2020 — 4.15pm
Data experts are concerned impending open banking and consumer data rights (CDR) schemes could build systemic security risks into the digital economy, as data shifts from the big banks to fintechs.
Speaking at tech festival Pause Fest in Melbourne on Thursday, the chief executive of data exchange technology platform Data Republic, Danny Gilligan, hailed the CDR laws' potential to boost competition. But he also said they should be focused on the sharing of insights, rather than the actual data.
"My only major criticism of CDR and open banking is that the regulatory framework advocates the flow of sensitive data from a high-security environment to a lower-security environment," he said.
"That's not meant to be a criticism of fintechs but the truth is, at the scale they operate, their security strategy is generally AWS [Amazon Web Services], whereas a bank might spend $100 million a year on cyber security. The better architecture would have been that we move and replicate data as little as possible and we maximise the flow of insights and outputs.
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Artificial Intelligence in Health Care
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is everywhere. At least five articles in my inbox this morning had an AI hook. And whether people are singing its praises (“AI will improve your speed, efficiency, and quality of work!”) or signaling its pitfalls (“Forget privacy as we [used to] know it!”), the fact is that AI is part of our everyday life – even if you aren’t on social media or riding in a driverless car.
In health care, the upside sell of AI is enticing. Data is - and always has been - everywhere in health care. In straightforward applications, AI promises to help providers work through data faster and more accurately to improve patient outcomes, or to spend less time recording data to spend more time with direct patient care. The ability to aggregate and analyze swaths of data ranging from pharmaceutical compound reactions and clinical trial outcomes to patient therapy responses and adverse events is not new, but as AI capabilities improve and expand, the health care applications are exciting.
Our ML Strategies colleague, Christian Tomatsu Fjeld, spent years as senior staff on the Senate Commerce Committee. Since AI falls under the Commerce Committee’s jurisdiction, he has deep experience considering the federal policy issues posed by AI. Recently, Christian and other experts joined a panel discussion hosted by the San Francisco Business Times where they discussed AI’s economic impact and what businesses should do to effectively leverage AI, as well as public policy and legal considerations for AI’s increasing presence in our daily lives. Their insights apply across all industries, but I found the panel’s discussion useful in considering some of the same questions around the promises and limitations of AI in healthcare.
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New digital health program launched for nurses and midwives
By ANMJ Staff|
February 5th, 2020|
Australian nursing and midwifery organisations are collaborating to create the first national framework to arm nurses and midwives with the digital health skills they need to deliver safe and quality care within a rapidly evolving digital workplace.
Undertaken by Health Informatics Society of Australia (HISA) and the Australian Digital Health Agency, nurses and midwives from across the country are now being called on to provide feedback on the specific digital health skills they need, what is practical and relevant for them, and how a draft digital health capability framework could be used in hospitals and health services as a guide for nursing and midwives working in a digital world.
Consultation began this month and will run for six weeks, with nurses encouraged to complete a survey, attend feedback sessions or email the project team.
National nursing and midwifery organisations part of the program’s Advisory Committee include the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF), Congress of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nurses and Midwives, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Accreditation Council, the Australian College of Midwives, and the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association.
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Consultation began this month and will run for six weeks, with nurses encouraged to complete a survey, attend feedback sessions or email the project team.
National nursing and midwifery organisations part of the program’s Advisory Committee include the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF), Congress of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nurses and Midwives, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Accreditation Council, the Australian College of Midwives, and the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association.
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University academics discover texting while walking is a potential health risk
But conclusions are still tentative, and more research is needed
5th February 2020
Sometimes you wonder why medical research takes so long to catch up with life in the real world, but academics say they have just discovered that “smartphone texting may be linked to compromised pedestrian safety”.
This tentative conclusion is based on a new meta-analysis of 14 experimental studies, which suggests texting while crossing the road is more dangerous than taking a call or listening to music.
The studies involved 872 subjects who, in most cases, were asked to walk on a treadmill and try to cross a virtual-reality road.
Texting or browsing the internet on a smartphone was linked to a 34% higher risk of being ‘hit’ or suffering a close call, compared with a 17% higher risk for holding a conversation.
Comment: Doh!
Comment: Doh!
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Workers putting businesses at risk of cyber attack
February 5, 2020 — 3.30pm
Almost one in two Australian workers are putting their company at risk of a cyber attack by opening emails and clicking links from unknown senders, downloading software and watching suspicious videos, according to a new survey.
The research comes as cyber security experts warn about the escalating threat of companies being held to ransom, with freight giant Toll Group battling a major ransomware attack which has forced the company to shut down its IT systems.
Research by Comparethemarket.com.au found 44 per cent of employees have put their company at risk of a cyber attack.
Medium-sized businesses compromised their employer the most, with more than half admitting to potentially opening up their systems to an an attack or data breach.
The survey of a nationally representative panel of 1007 Australian employees found older workers were putting their businesses at risk through the use of email, with two thirds of 50 to 67-year-olds opening an email attachment from an unknown contact.
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Navigating My Health Record one year on
By Michael Mackenzie on Life Matters
It's been just over a year since the My Health Record system was expanded to all Australians, barring those who opted out of the system.
My Health Record was billed as a good way to improve health outcomes and cut costs. But reports suggest less than one in 10 people have ever logged on to look at their files. Meanwhile, data security concerns persist.
Guests:
Dr Helen Almond, Lecturer in Digital Health and a former Nurse Practitioner
Dr Charlotte Hespe, Sydney-based GP and spokesperson for the Royal Australian College of General Practitioner
David Vaile, Chair of the Australian Privacy Foundation, Stream Lead for Data Protection and Surveillance, Allens Hub for Technology, Law & Innovation at UNSW Law
Duration: 22min 27sec
Broadcast: Wed 5 Feb 2020, 9:06am
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Cyber and Data Risk Predictions 2020
From deepfakes to GDPR, we offer our international experts' predictions on the opportunities and challenges that the cyber and data risk market may face in the coming year and beyond.
1. Artificial intelligence and deepfakes will be used by hackers to undermine cybersecurity
Artificial intelligence (AI) will usher in a new era of offensive cyber-attacks and defensive cyber security measures. Businesses are implementing AI as part of their cybersecurity defences to protect data and help thwart cyber threats. It is inevitable that attackers will equally look to the same technology to open new doors as quickly as they are closed. It may not be long, therefore, before AI cyber security becomes an arms race in itself. Deepfakes, the modification of images, video and audio recordings through AI so that they appear genuine, could pave the way for more personalised scams and frauds. Many cyber-attacks begin with a phishing email maliciously fooling individuals into disclosing credentials or authorising payments through emails that are surprisingly convincing. If hackers are able to utilise the sophisticated technology behind deepfakes, it is conceivable that they could mimic human voice commands by telephone so they appear to come from a trusted source. Rapid advances in AI are also raising new technological possibilities, particularly in the field of cyber security. Those companies that have the resources to access this technology may fare best in this new arms race. Unfortunately, those organisations that do not, risk becoming the new "low hanging fruit" for cyber attackers.
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Why the secret sharing of MBS data with police must stop
Dr Arnold is an assistant professor in the School of Law at the University of Canberra.
5th February 2020
The issue is a simple one and one doctors care about: the privacy of their patients.
In 2018, there was mass fury as the public began to realise there were alarming loopholes surrounding the billion-dollar My Health Record scheme, and the fact that law enforcers and government agencies were able to access their sensitive clinical information without a police warrant.
These agencies only had to convince the Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) that the information was necessary to prevent crime, to counter “seriously improper conduct” or to “protect the public revenue”.
In the end, the Federal Government was forced to act, and court oversight of these requests was eventually guaranteed through legislation.
But there has been less visibility when it comes to the protection of patients’ PBS and MBS information; probably because few have realised, until recently, how vulnerable it is.
Patients, lawyers and health practitioners will have read last year that the Department of Human Services has been routinely sharing personally identifiable health data drawn from the PBS and MBS with law-enforcement agencies.
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E-prescribing provides accurate, real-time information
You can reduce medication-related risks with the right data and systems, writes Gerard Stevens.
If the aged care industry were to make a to-do list now in direct response to the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, what action would be at the top?
Reducing the number of medication-related incidents would be my choice.
It would also be the choice of Professor Johanna Westbrook, director of the Centre for Health Systems and Safety Research at Macquarie University, who told the commission that errors associated with medication management were the most common complaint arising from residential aged care facilities.
In giving evidence, Prof Westbrook emphasised the need for better systems and greater coordination between pharmacists, GPs and nurses to improve medication safety.
She referred to a study she led that found aged care residents on average had nearly 10 discrepancies between the GP’s medication records and the records kept at the facility.
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Former Google unit's latest tool to help journalists spot fake images
By Davey Alba
February 5, 2020 — 10.51am
A doctored, phony image of President Barack Obama shaking hands with President Hassan Rouhani of Iran. A real photograph of a Muslim girl at a desk doing her homework with Donald Trump looming in the background on television.
It is not always easy to tell the difference between real and fake photographs. But the pressure to get it right has never been more urgent as the amount of false political content online continues to rise.
Jigsaw, a company that identifies online threats, develops cutting-edge tech and is owned by Google's parent, has now unveiled a free tool that researchers said could help journalists spot doctored photographs; even ones created with the help of artificial intelligence.
Jigsaw — known as Google Ideas when it was founded — said it was testing the tool, called Assembler, with more than a dozen news and fact-checking organisations around the world. They include Animal Politico in Mexico, Rappler in the Philippines and Agence France-Presse. It does not plan to offer the tool to the public.
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Tech rich lister warns of 'underlying racist narrative' in coronavirus threat
By Emma Koehn
February 4, 2020 — 11.58am
Young rich lister and tech founder Tim Fung has warned coronavirus is being used "as an opportunity to legitimise racism".
"As an Australian with Asian heritage, it makes me sad to see the lack of empathy for our fellow human beings in China and it makes me angry to see selective fact-sharing being used to create sensationalist news and propel an underlying racist narrative," Mr Fung wrote in a post on LinkedIn over the weekend.
"I wish we were better than this."
Mr Fung is the chief executive and co-founder of gig economy marketplace Airtasker and in 2019 was listed on the Australian Financial Review Young Rich List with an estimated wealth of $28 million.
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How care.data’s failure helped transform Australian healthcare
By Tim Kelsey
By Tim Kelsey
3 February 2020
Australia has one of the best health services in the world with some of the best outcomes.
But it could be better: as many as 250,000 avoidable hospital admissions are reported to occur each year because of medication misadventure; up to 18 per cent of diagnostic tests may be duplicated; it has serious issues with equity of access for those living in remote and rural Australia, particularly among indigenous people whose lifespan is, on average, eight years lower than residents of the more prosperous suburbs on the Eastern seaboard.
I have travelled across this continent on many occasions and the distances are still eye-watering – it can take five hours to fly from Perth to Sydney, longer than from London to Moscow. It is difficult to imagine a better case for the use of basic digital services, like video consultation, to empower people in remote country to speak to a doctor or a nurse quickly and conveniently – but adoption of telehealth has been slow.
For these reasons, the Australian government decided four years ago to put data and technology to work to solve some of these problems and bring an end to the dangerous dependence of Australian medicine on paper and the fax machine.
In 2016, the Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) was established to design and implement a new national digital health strategy and I was appointed its inaugural chief executive.
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But it could be better: as many as 250,000 avoidable hospital admissions are reported to occur each year because of medication misadventure; up to 18 per cent of diagnostic tests may be duplicated; it has serious issues with equity of access for those living in remote and rural Australia, particularly among indigenous people whose lifespan is, on average, eight years lower than residents of the more prosperous suburbs on the Eastern seaboard.
I have travelled across this continent on many occasions and the distances are still eye-watering – it can take five hours to fly from Perth to Sydney, longer than from London to Moscow. It is difficult to imagine a better case for the use of basic digital services, like video consultation, to empower people in remote country to speak to a doctor or a nurse quickly and conveniently – but adoption of telehealth has been slow.
For these reasons, the Australian government decided four years ago to put data and technology to work to solve some of these problems and bring an end to the dangerous dependence of Australian medicine on paper and the fax machine.
In 2016, the Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA) was established to design and implement a new national digital health strategy and I was appointed its inaugural chief executive.
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Australian Privacy Laws Must Be Strengthened
The Department of Human Services fields thousands of requests for Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) and Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS) data from state and federal policing agencies each year, complying with the vast majority of them.
The information released can, if detailed enough, paint a picture of a person’s medical history, including, for example, any history of mental health issues, HIV, abortion or sexually transmitted diseases.
No warrant required
And unlike My Heath Record, no warrant or court order is needed for the Department to release the information. Instead, it uses its own internal guidelines to decide how it will respond to a police request. These guidelines, which were created more than a decade ago, have not been updated and are not available to public.
Until recently, there has been no imperative to release these guidelines until The Medical Republic, a specialist media publication, won a freedom of information battle to have them brought out into the open.
According to the guidelines, department officials are required to consider whether the disclosure of private health data is necessary, and not merely convenient or helpful. They are also meant to check whether the information is available through other channels.
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My Health Record: harmonised data quality assessment across the data lifecycle
Event date: 12 February 2020 - 12:00pm to 1:00pm
Location: Room 305, Level 3, Samuels Building, UNSW Upper Campus, Kensington
Open to: Open to all
Cost: Free - no booking required
Event Type: Seminar
School/Unit: School of Public Health and Community Medicine, SPHCM
The My Health Record (MHR) data repository stores patient summaries uploaded from information systems of participating health services across Australia. Linked with patient-level information from various datasets, it provides a clinician- and patient-centric view of longitudinal health data. The MHR data custodian aims to support researchers and public health services with fit-for-purpose data. The MHR system requires a comprehensive DQ assessment framework that includes intrinsic, technical and contextual categories to adequately address challenges inherent in the creation and curation of data repositories derived from multiple sources. Balancing privacy and security with the FAIR Guiding Principles requires a culture of reciprocity, transparency and interoperability as well as good documentation at point of care, good data management, good data governance and good reporting. This presentation describes how the framework was developed.
About Professor Teng Liaw
Professor Liaw is a Clinician-Scientist whose research focuses on Informatics, Connected Health and Patient-Centred Care. He established the UNSW electronic Practice Based Research Network (ePBRN) to conduct research on the use of observational data from EHRs for clinical and informatics research, evaluation, audit and quality improvement activities. He has received research funding from NHMRC, ARC, research foundations and governments. He has published 200+ peer-reviewed papers on digital health; general practice, connected health, quality, data analytics; universal health coverage, vulnerable populations; social enterprise and sustainable development in cross-cultural contexts. He heads the UNSW WHO Collaborating Centre on eHealth; chairs the RACGP National Research & Evaluation Ethics Committee; and is Associate Editor of Int J Med Informatics and BMJ Health & Care Informatics. He is elected Fellow of the International Academy for Health Sciences Informatics, American College of Medical Informatics, and Australasian College of Health Informatics.
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ADHA have released updated statistics on MHR usage
3 February 2020 ADHA Propaganda
The ADHA have released updated numbers regarding My Health Record usage.
Key statistics from March 2019 to December 2019:
- 22.68 million My Health Records (an increase of 30,000 in December)
- 12.99 million records with information in them (an increase of 490,000 in December)
- 1.7 billion documents in the system (100 million increase in December)
- 49.3 million clinical documents (5.7 million increase in December)
- 101.4 million medicine documents (9.8 million increase in December)
- Hospitals uploaded 500,000 more documents in December than November
Professor Meredith Makeham, the Australian Digital Health Agency’s Chief Medical Officer, said “While it was not expected that all My Health Records would have documents uploaded in the first year as not everyone would see a GP or other connected healthcare provider service in that timeframe, we are now seeing significant increases in uploaded clinical documents and My Health Records with valuable clinical information.”
There have also been cases where My Health Record has been a useful source of information for pharmacists, who were then able to dispense medications to both locals and visitors trapped in the towns affected by bushfires and in turn provide patient continuity of care.
Click here to read the full media release from the ADHA.
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Do video games groom kids for future addiction?
Antony is a medical reporter with a special interest in technology and pharmacy.
4th February 2020
The UK's National Health Service is demanding a ban on a public health menace — but it’s not junk food advertising or unpasteurised milk or Gwyneth Paltrow’s Netflix series.
It’s loot boxes.
For those not among the estimated 100 million players of Call of Duty, a loot box is a video game reward bought with real money — but with the twist that buyers don’t know precisely what the reward will be. It could have high in-game value, or it could be your 10th version of the same Overwatch outfit.
It's a lottery ticket, except on offer is not a one-in-14-million Powerball chance of winning permanent retirement, but just the chance of getting a fancy new in-game gun or outfit or power-up for your character.
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ACCC, Google prepare for mediation in Android privacy case
By Rohan Pearce
Editor, Computerworld | 3 February 2020 12:34 AEDT
The Australian Competition and Commission (ACCC) and Google are preparing for mediation in a Federal Court case that centres on the collection and use of location data by the Android operating system.
The two parties appeared this morning for a short case management hearing in Sydney before Justice Thawley.
The parties will head to mediation in the week commencing 3 August. “This is a common practice for proceedings in the Federal Court of Australia,” an ACCC spokesperson told Computerworld.
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Unfolding privacy class actions in Australia
Claimants in Australia face a number of challenges to successfully bringing a privacy class action, including the absence of a clear cause of action and difficulties in quantifying loss. Despite the challenges, on 9 December 2019, the Supreme Court of NSW in Evans v Health Administration Corporation approved a $275,000 settlement as fair and reasonable in Australia’s first data breach class action. The settlement saw each group member receive around $2,400 and the lead plaintiff, Tracy Evans, around $10,000 for her stress and burden as the representative plaintiff.
Hurdles to future class actions
The current Australian regime does not provide individuals with a specific statutory right comparable to that in the UK and the US to make a claim for breach of privacy. Currently, individuals have the right to:
- make an individual or representative complaint to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). The Information Commissioner is the only person with standing to bring a claim; or
- commence legal proceedings on the basis of other statutes, common law and equitable causes of action, depending on the relationship between the claimant and the offending entity.
The challenges faced by claimants are further exacerbated by the High Court’s decision in ABC v Lenah Game Meats Pty Ltd, in which the Court declined to recognise the existence of a tort of privacy, but suggested that, in appropriate circumstances, it may be recognised in the future. It is likely that Claimants will continue to allege the existence of a tort of privacy, until it is revisited by a superior court.
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Tech giants’ mixed message
· The Times
Something strange is happening in Silicon Valley. Tech tycoons are asking — nay, pleading — to be regulated. Alphabet’s Sundar Pichai said this month that artificial intelligence was “too important” not to be governed by new laws. He was joined by Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, who said at Davos that Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which the industry fought tooth and nail, was a “fantastic start” that he hoped America would soon emulate.
Even Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg is pining for new rules. He wrote last year: “Law-makers often tell me we have too much power over speech, and frankly I agree.” He listed areas where he would invite “sensible” regulation, ranging from privacy to ensuring the integrity of elections and blocking harmful content. The 35-year-old billionaire will be in Munich this month to discuss “a framework for new rules and regulation for the internet” with European politicians.
The public pleas for a crackdown are, however, at odds with a very different dynamic unfolding behind the scenes. Big Tech has launched a fierce, well-funded campaign to stamp out a crackdown entirely or, at worst, craft rules that could in fact tighten its stranglehold.
To understand the forces at play, look no further than lobbying dollars. Amazon is run by the world’s richest person, Jeff Bezos, who has pointedly not joined the pro-regulation chorus. Last year he grabbed the throne as America’s top corporate lobbyist, lavishing dollars $16.8m ($25.1m) on a team of 100-plus in Washington, according to the Centre for Responsive Politics.
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Privacy crackdown a blow to Facebook’s business model
Facebook is facing a perfect storm of privacy trends and increased regulation that will affect not only its ad targeting effectiveness but its whole business model, a leading advertising executive has told The Australian.
The US tech giant released its earnings last week. Its stock plunged by more than 7 per cent after posting a 51 per cent rise in expenses, and a drastically declining operating margin.
In 2018, Facebook’s operating margin was 45 per cent. Last year, it plunged to just 34 per cent.
The company is facing three privacy trends that will combine to reduce its ad targeting signals, according to the CEO of digital advertising outfit Polar, Kunal Gupta, who said regulatory pressure from Australia and Europe would begin to bite.
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30 January 2020
Why health is the ‘worst case’ scenario for text mining
Think about how many keystrokes you make every day in your practice. Now, multiply that number by 744,437 – the number of registered health practitioners in Australia.
That’ll give you a rough idea of just how much free text is being generated by the health sector each day.
This free text is a goldmine glistening with potentially useful data.
Let’s take something most doctors would really like to know about their patients: what medications they are currently taking. The patient sitting in front of you can’t remember and they’ve forgotten to bring their medicine kit. How nice would it be if a computer could trawl through all the written medical records that exist about the patient and compile a list of likely recent medications?
This kind of intelligent system would never be out of work. For example, it could find all the patients overdue for a pap smear or a vaccination. Or it could match patients with rare kinds of cancers to clinical trials, compile data on adverse events or create registries. The list of potential uses is endless.
But there’s a snag, and it’s a major one. The language used in electronic medical records is deeply confusing to a computer.
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Smartphones and wearable technology: benefits and concerns in cardiology
David Jin, Heath Adams, Anthony M Cocco, William G Martin and Sonny Palmer
Med J Aust 2020; 212 (2): . || doi: 10.5694/mja2.50446
Published online: 3 February 2020
Published online: 3 February 2020
The global expansion of wearable technology combined with smartphone access creates new questions and opportunities in the diagnosis and management of cardiac conditions
Wearable devices along with smartphone technology are becoming more common in developed nations such as Australia, with the number of connected devices expected to increase from 526 million in 2017 to over 1.1 billion worldwide in 2022.1 This new source of health information has led to novel methods of patient assessment, such as a single‐lead electrocardiograph (ECG) creating a pre‐presentation observation chart. This creates a paradigm shift where instead of symptomatic patients being referred for cardiac assessment, asymptomatic patients are now presenting with health data. In this article, we discuss the technology behind the devices, common brands and formats, potential applications, and advantages and disadvantages of wearable devices.
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National Medicines Policy 2.0: a vision for the future
· Andrew J McLachlan, Parisa Aslani
- Aust Prescr 2020;43:24–6
- 3 February 2020
- DOI: 10.18773/austprescr.2020.007
SUMMARY
Australia’s National Medicines Policy was launched 20 years ago with the aim of improving health outcomes for all Australians. It was developed in partnership with healthcare professionals, consumers and the pharmaceutical industry.
The key parts of the Policy focus on timely access to high-quality and affordable medicines and their safe and judicious use. It also supports a viable and responsible pharmaceutical industry.
Since the Policy was first launched, Australia has seen significant changes in healthcare systems, medicines subsidies, health services remuneration, digital technologies and the pharmaceutical industry.
Medicines themselves have also changed, as have consumers’ expectations. To respond to these changes, the National Medicines Policy needs to be updated with a greater focus on implementing and measuring outcomes.
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Comments more than welcome!
David.
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