Slashdot Mirror
New Australian Privacy Laws Could Have Ramifications On Google Glass
An anonymous reader writes "Recording private conversations or activities using Google's Glass eyewear or similar wearable technologies without consent could become illegal under a push to overhaul Australian state and federal privacy laws. From the article: 'The Australian Law Reform Commission discussion paper, released on Monday morning, recommended 47 legislative changes aimed at updating existing privacy laws for the digital age. It proposed the government introduce a statutory cause of action for a serious invasion of one’s privacy, in what would be the first time a person’s privacy has legally been protected in Australia. It also recommended harmonising rules for using technology to monitor and record authors, which are currently legislated by state governments, to deal with the implications of new technologies such as wearable devices and drones.'"
Information is for the state. You will not record and share among yourselves. You will not become more aware.
You will not develop the capacity to police yourselves. That is for the state.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
"monitor and record authors"? So I have to write a book to get privacy protections?
So they're going to stop using CCTV cameras in public places?
Yeah, didn't think so.
Google Glass is just going to be seen as a crude precursor when some day in the future, we can serialize and deserialize memories. What will be the objections then?
Eventually we will get to the point where we just record our experiences without the need of cameras. I doubt this is even 50 years away. Society will have to get used to a post-privacy world eventually. Simple devices such as the Google Glass seem to be as good a start as any.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
Google Glass only records from a first person point of view, and is less sensitive than normal human eyes or ears. So, pretty much by definition, if it can be recorded by Google Glass, it isn't private: the person doing the recording needs to be visibly present to record the information.
What such laws are really primarily aimed at are to protect government officials, politicians, and the rich and famous from having their wrongdoings documented.
While they are a Government body the Australian Law Reform Commission is almost completely powerless. They are "commissioned" by the government in power to look at a particular concept and they then report back. In this case the previous Labor government commissioned them to look into "What can we do to protect people's privacy!?!?!?!?" this was political grandstanding at the time and given each state is the one that determines the rules when it comes to privacy has absolutely no chance of being rolled out.
For example it is legal to record a telephone call you are involved in, without telling the other person, in Queensland. But it's not if you are in NSW. NSW has the tightest privacy laws so basing their study on them is logical from that perspective but also means the starting point for every other state is further along than the article would make it appear.
Hungary law requires photographers to ask permission to take pictures.
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/...
Just saying one is going to need to read up on local legalities if/when they visit a foreign country; disabling the appropriate Google glass feature as required.
Check out Istanbul Turkey on Google Earth, many areas are like this (almost blacked out). Google glasses on the ground in that area could cause the wearer problems.
In other news in Australia our Attorney General is defending free speech, in particular the right to express racist views.
So if you record someone being a racist in a public place, the racist calls the cops and get the witness to racism put in jail.
(2 and half more years of these conservative loonatics)
http://www.news.com.au/nationa...
This article is somewhat alarmist. There's nothing changing for Google Glass. The courts have successfully upheld the old privacy laws regardless of the technology used to invade privacy. The key part here is that the changes in laws doesn't actually change what is classed as private or public.
- It's already illegal to record people in private without their consent, I don't understand where the AFR get's the idea that it's not.
- If you're in a public place you're typically not going to bump into any privacy problems (legally anyway, some people go insane at the sight of a camera).
Despite what the article says, nothing in the proposed changes make it illegal to record a public conversation. Australia's has a long history of case law that covers what is private and what is public. What these laws are doing is simply codifying the rules the court already apply.
Nothing to see here, wearing Google Glass is not going to be illegal and you're free to record anything with Glass that you are free to record without Glass as you would right now. I.e. don't go peeking into your neighbours window.
Stay away. If you know what's good for you. Stay away.
Makes it sound like the government cares about your privacy while they continue to spy on everything you do: http://www.theguardian.com/wor...
I was talking with another parent after church yesterday. Her son is being bullied. Another kid who lives across the street. He intimidates her son, threatens physical violence, traps him when he walks down the sidewalk, trespasses on her property, vandalizes her property, destroys her son's toys (smashed up a soccer goal by swinging it into rocks), etc. I advised her, well a number of courses of action, but most of all: Install Video Cameras. Get it on tape. Even if it's just on youtube, she can do a lot to discourage this bully and his family (who insists their son would never do anything like that).
Google glass would be better. Bullies everywhere will rejoice now. They can operate without fear.
From TFA:
Under the proposal, courts would be able to compensate victims, but the ALRC said it would not propose penalties for offenders.
It doesn't seem clear that they are proposing much of a ban on anything, really. This looks like more of a compensation scheme if someone does infringe on your privacy in this kind of way and you then suffer some significant, financially quantifiable harm from it.
I would argue that many/most infringements on privacy (or the chilling effect that comes from the threat of having your privacy infringed) are not so easily quantifiable, that the law in many places has little meaningful recognition of non-financial damage, and that some behaviours can't be fixed by compensation after the fact anyway. It doesn't look like they're going as far as addressing these issues so far, though.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
"Recording private conversations or activities using Google's Glass eyewear or similar wearable technologies without consent could become illegal "
SO recording private conversations or activities using my cellphone or other recording device is 100% legal? No it's not.
What is it with these incredibly low IQ politicians making laws that are 100% useless? there are existing laws that work just fine and fit the case perfectly.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
France does something similar, has for a while: http://photothisandthat.co.uk/...
Fuck you.
Just ask the last glasshole who happened to stare at me. He's still crying for that. Literally.
The key word here is "recording". Something recorded is less private than something ephemerally witnessed by another person.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
The resolution of Google Glass's recording isn't the problem, rather it is that actions recorded by it are not forgotten.
And funnily enough, Europe has recognised that not being able to be forgotten is also a privacy risk.
So whilst everyone MIGHT be able to record when I go for coffee and walk down the street talking to my co-workers, the reality is that it ISN'T and that whilst in public there is also a certain amount of privacy involved as the area is busy both visually and aurally, making it hard for someone to casually record what I do (by memorising my actions) or say.
Google Glass and similar devices take that privacy away from me and everyone else on the street.
Google Glass (and similar) need to go in the same box as beta.slashdot: the bit bucket from hell and never return.
Oh, there's one exception to that: an owner of Google Glass should always have their device turned on and functioning when dealing with police and any other representatives of law enforcement.
...about them? Are employees allowed to wear them at work? Including during meetings and other group activities?
It's not really about privacy if I'm allowed to film my family on vacation with a camera, but can't do the same with Google glass. If I'm in a public space, do I really have a right to privacy? I don't think I do.
Right now publishing photos of people in places governed by the Napoleonic Code such as Quebec opens the publisher up to damages because people have a "copyright" of their faces. The sheer volume of images published means that it's either a gold mine for Canadian lawyers or something to be consigned to the dustbin of history.
Both for the public and for the safety of douche canoes wearing Google Glass who are asking to get their ass beat.
These laws against recording in public are an early step toward curtailing freedom of speech. The recent popularity of variations on this, particularly with regard toward laws against recording police officers should be a tip-off.
We already have laws that differentiate between what's acceptable in public versus private space: walking around naked, for instance. Blurring this line looks like something that favors those who would erode and limit the public space.
So, I'm reading this to include all police and retail security cameras.
"Hi, welcome to Walmart, sign here to allow us to monitor you while you shop. Have a great day!"
in most countries, at lest in europe, it's not allowed to record conversations and take pictures of someone and make them public without the consent of that person. yes, it does have ramifications on cameras on cell phone, on glasshole toys and any other recording device. and it's also common sense to respect others privacy and not take pics of them and upload and share everywhere without them agreeing first.
Under the Telecommunications Act (since about 1974, maybe before) it has always been illegal to record conversations without the consent of all parties. I'm guessing they're trying to apply it here before Glass is a communications device, being connected all the time.