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This weekly blog is to explore the news around 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 were dated 6 December, 2018 and we have seen none since! Its pretty sad!
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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https://www.innovationaus.com/australias-vaccination-certificate-approach-sad-news-for-privacy/
Australia’s vaccination certificate approach ‘sad news for privacy’
Denham
Sadler
National Affairs Editor
27 September 2021
There is “no rational reason” for the way Australian governments are currently planning to roll out digital COVID-19 vaccination certificates, which is less secure and more damaging to privacy than other approaches used elsewhere in the world, a prominent cryptography expert says.
National Cabinet recently agreed that states and territories will integrate digital vaccination certificates into their own check-in apps, with the exact details of how this will work left up to each jurisdiction. Australians are also now able to download a pdf version of their vaccination certificate, which can be added to a smartphone wallet.
It’s unclear exactly how these certificates will be integrated into the QR code check-in apps, and little further information has been provided so far.
The approach is significantly different to that taken by the European Union, which has adopted a QR code certificate with a digital signature to provide its authenticity.
This is now the biggest vaccine passport scheme in the world with more than 40 countries using it, including all 27 EU members. The EU has provided a digital platform, which acts as a gateway through which vaccination certificates from participating countries can be scanned and verified.
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https://www.innovationaus.com/audit-launched-into-services-australias-reliance-on-contractors/
Audit launched into Services Australia’s reliance on contractors
Denham
Sadler
National Affairs Editor
30 September 2021
The national audit office has turned its attention to the prevalence of contractors at Services Australia, following concerns the agency has a “serious problem” with tech capability due to its over-reliance on outsourced work.
The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has launched an inquiry into the effectiveness of Services Australia’s management of contractors, to be tabled in June next year.
The audit will investigate the agency’s arrangements for the management of contractors, and whether fit-for-purpose frameworks are in place for the use, engagement and management of these contractors.
The ANAO has also launched an audit into the Department of Defence’s use of contractors with the same terms of reference.
The audit will likely focus on the use of contractors for tech work, with Services Australia being the government’s primary service delivery agency, and labour hire commonly used for digital work.
Auditor-General Grant Hehir flagged the inquiry at a Senate committee hearing in August.
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https://www.innovationaus.com/sydney-healthtech-big-picture-has-big-plans/
Sydney healthtech Big Picture has big plans
Joseph Brookes
Senior Reporter
1 October 2021
An Australian healthtech company has its sights set on the digital infrastructure behind the multitrillion-dollar healthcare market after nearly a decade building out a digital platform that began as a student’s thesis.
The company, Big Picture Medical, needed to go offshore to finance and prove the platform but says Australian government support to commercialise it was “instrumental” because it plugged the gaps in local capital markets and validated its technology.
Big Picture Medical’s ultimate plan is to become the “operating system for healthcare”, its founder and chief executive Dr Tom McKinnon tells InnovationAus.
Like an operating system, the Big Picture platform provides the infrastructure, for existing care providers and technologies. Dr McKinnon acknowledges this is a massive challenge to deploy widely but believes it will bring down costs, improve patient outcomes and open new care models.
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https://medicalrepublic.com.au/phns-go-to-war-with-industry-on-gp-data-and-software/54795
1 October 2021
PHNs go to war with industry on GP data and software
AIHW Data General practice Government PHNs TheHill
If “Data is the new oil” (Clive Humby ) patient data is the “new oil” of health transformation.
People all over the world aren’t quite there in realising its value yet but everyone understands it is hugely valuable so there is a rush on to obtain it and control it.
In Australia, there are two huge oil wells of data that parties are rushing to obtain and use: patient data from the electronic medical records (EMRs) of hospitals, and patient data from the patient management systems of GPs and specialists.
In the data lie secrets to all sorts of upside for our healthcare system – how to much better identify and manage patients for chronic conditions, where to concentrate particular health system resources, where and how to fund doctors in the community more efficiently, where to locate hospitals, what resources to put in those hospitals, and so on.
Given the inexorable shift of our health system towards chronic care management in the community, GP patient data is probably the most valuable and accessible data well. So the rush to control GP data is in full swing.
It started in earnest messily mid 2019 when the Department of Health set up Practice Incentives Program (PIP) and its Quality Improvement (QI) incentive and started paying doctors to extract data and send it on to their PHNs.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/government-unveils-digital-identity-bill-570671
Government unveils digital identity bill
By Justin Hendry on Oct 1, 2021 12:38PM
For state govt, private sector expansion.
The government has published an exposure draft of its long-awaited bill for the expansion of the country’s federated digital identity system to state and territory governments and the private sector.
The exposure draft, which is open for feedback until October 27, follows two previous rounds of public consultation over the last 12 months comes as the government prepares to introduce the legislation into parliament.
The Trusted Digital Identity Bill will enshrine the privacy and consumer protections behind the system, including some of those within the existing trusted digital identity framework (TDIF), in law and establish long-term governance arrangements.
New privacy protections that are in addition to those already provided through the Privacy Act will also be created through the bill, while grounds for the disclosure of personal information to law enforcement agencies will be tightened.
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Greater Houston Healthconnect Uses InterSystems HealthShare® to Create Largest Known COVID-19 Outcomes Study
GHH has assembled a cohort of more than one million COVID-19 positive cases with all associated medical histories for outcomes analysis
Sydney, Australia, October 1, 2021 — InterSystems, a data technology provider dedicated to helping customers solve the most critical scalability, interoperability, and speed challenges, and Greater Houston Healthconnect (GHH) health information exchange (HIE) today announced the initial results of the largest COVID-19 outcome research study to date. Conducted using InterSystems HealthShare®, the study examines more than one million COVID-19 cases to identify comorbidities that may represent risk factors for severe illness or death.
GHH is one of the largest HIEs in the United States and is connected to more than 95% of hospitals and healthcare systems in the greater Houston area. In total, GHH reaches over 15 million unique individuals and is linked to more than 1,500 healthcare facilities across greater Houston, South and East Texas, and Western Louisiana.
Since the onset of COVID-19 in early 2020, GHH began identifying positive-tested patients into a cohort, then queried for the medical histories of the cohort, aggregating and standardising the data. A community-wide collaboration of specialists and researchers performed extensive analysis to determine symptom complexes and other risk factors resulting in bad outcomes. Using InterSystems HealthShare, GHH collected and refined sociodemographic, behavioural, clinical and laboratory data from these individuals in order to track the proliferation of the pandemic across geographical areas and provide situational awareness to Public Health Authorities, healthcare providers and health services researchers.
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https://stayhappening.com/e/mygov-and-my-health-record-launceston-library-E3LUSS0B5NF7
myGov and My Health Record @ Launceston Library
Wed Nov 24 2021 at 09:30 am to 11:00 am UTC+11:00
Launceston Library | Launceston ADHA Propaganda
Publisher/Host Launceston Library
Learn more
about the myGov website and your My Health Record on myGov.
About this Event
This session will show you how My Health works, how to set it up, how you can control what information it contains and who can see it.
If you have any questions or accessibility requirements, please contact us at (03) 6777 2446.
As this program is currently modified to meet public gathering restrictions, we have limited spaces available.
We ask that you please register here, or call your local library if you need help making a booking. If you are no longer able to make an event, please let us know so that others don’t miss out.
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Thursday, 30 September 2021 09:43
Panel calls for giving government emergency powers during cyber attacks
A joint parliamentary committee has proposed that an amendment to the laws governing critical infrastructure be split up into two, in order to pass what it says are "urgent reforms".
The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security said in a statement on Wednesday that emergency powers which were part of the Security Legislation Amendment (Critical Infrastructure) Bill 2020 should be passed immediately.
The bill expands greatly the sectors that are covered to include communications, financial services, data storage and processing, defence industry, higher education and space technology.
Companies from these sectors would have to compulsorily report to the government if they suffered cyber attacks. They would also have to allow government security experts to step in and do what whatever was deemed necessary to stop an attack progressing.
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YouTube to remove videos containing vaccine misinformation
By Dave Sebastian
The Wall Street Journal
7:01AM September 30, 2021
YouTube said it would remove content that falsely alleges approved vaccines are dangerous and cause severe health effects, expanding the video platform’s efforts to curb Covid-19 misinformation to other vaccines.
Examples of content that would be taken down include false claims that approved vaccines cause autism, cancer or infertility or that they don’t reduce transmission or contraction of diseases, the Alphabet division said.
The policies cover general statements about vaccines -- not only those for Covid-19 -- and about specific routine immunisation such as those for measles and hepatitis B. YouTube said it has removed more than 130,000 videos for violating its Covid-19 vaccine policies since last year.
“We’ve steadily seen false claims about the coronavirus vaccines spill over into misinformation about vaccines in general,” YouTube said. “We’re now at a point where it’s more important than ever to expand the work we started with Covid-19 to other vaccines.”
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/accc-wants-new-powers-to-counter-googles-ad-tech-dominance-570461
ACCC wants new powers to counter Google's ad tech dominance
By Kate Weber on Sep 28, 2021 1:15PM
Existing competition laws not strong enough to address issues.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) wants new powers to rein in Google and its dominance in the advertising technology ('ad tech') sector.
In a report [pdf], the ACCC said more than “90 percent of ad impressions traded via the ad tech supply chain passed through at least one Google service in 2020”.
The commission said it had identified "systemic competition concerns relating to conduct over many years" in the sector, and needed better intervention options than are currently available.
"Investigation and enforcement proceedings under general competition laws are not well suited to deal with these sorts of broad concerns, and can take too long if anti-competitive harm is to be prevented,” ACCC chair Rod Sims said.
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Tuesday, 28 September 2021 11:01
Google ad tech supply chain dominance 'harming businesses, individuals’
Google's dominance in the advertising technology supply chain is harming both companies and individuals, the ACCC says in a report published on Tuesday.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission had undertaken an inquiry into the ad tech sector beginning in March last year. It said it had identified significant competition concerns and likely harm to publishers, advertisers and consumers. A preliminary report was issued in January this year.
Google was found to have a dominant position in key parts of the ad tech supply chain and the ACCC estimated more than 90% of ad tech impressions traded via this chain passed through at least one Google service.
The ACCC commented that Google's dominance was made possible by multiple factors, "including its access to consumer and other data, access to exclusive inventory and integration across its ad tech services".
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Big Tech is monitoring our moods and employers are paying attention
By Andrew Orlowski
September 28, 2021 — 11.15am
Imagine dying suddenly and failing to inform Facebook. It’s probably the thing about death we fear most - that Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t find out right away. Fear not, because Apple has this awful eventuality covered.
Apple now interprets sensor information to report your emotional state, and has published technical details of how to access it. In their wisdom, Apple’s boffins have decreed that there are 10 detectable emotional states, and curiously, one of these is “death”. How do you emotionally convey you’re dead? The absence of a pulse would make this one of the simpler interpretive challenges, you might think.
But joking aside, this macabre discovery is part of a worrying trend by big technology companies: gleaning your emotional condition for others to peruse. Unscrupulous employers and lazy public health officials will barely be able to contain their glee, but for employees, and the rest of us, this may be very ominous indeed.
Last year Amazon introduced a fitness watch, Halo, with an unusual feature. Halo does all the usual things every fitness tracker does, like count steps and take your pulse. Only it introduced something new, too: a mood monitor. Listening to your voice, the Halo judges if you’re being too angry or assertive - and not only that, but gives you warnings to mind your tone. This is an electronic mood cop that lives on your body, telling you off. It doesn’t take much imagination to see how employers will use this data when they want to shed staff for reasons other than performance - as some are keen to do already. Injudicious employees now don’t have to worry about upsetting the staff - they might upset the sensor censors, too.
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https://marketplace.service.gov.au/2/digital-marketplace/opportunities/16170
Australian Digital Health Agency
Probity Advisory Services
Opportunity ID
16170
Deadline for asking questions
Monday 27 September 2021 at 6pm (in Canberra)
Application closing date
Wednesday 29 September 2021 at 6pm (in Canberra)
Published
Friday 24 September 2021
Panel category
Support and Operations
Overview
The Australian Digital Health Agency requires an independent probity advisor to oversee and/or assist in ICT related procurement processes.
Estimated start date
1st October 2021
Location of work
Australian
Capital Territory
New South Wales
Queensland
Victoria
Offsite
Working arrangements
Work can be completed off site, with attendance to meetings either face-to-face or virtually.
Length of contract
12 Months
Contract extensions
2 x 12 Months
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David.
