In [yet another] major embarrassment for Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, the Privacy Commissioner has labelled the inadvertent Google Wi-Fi data collection bungle – (the same bungle that Conroy called “the biggest privacy breach in history”) – as “not so bad”.
| Google Wi-Fi Snooping Not So Bad: Privacy Commissioner |
There are several golden snippets from the above article, credited to the commissioner, Karen Curtis:
- “At this stage, it appears payload data that has been collected comprises only fragments – 0.2-second snatches.”
- “My Office has not examined the payload data collected, and we have told Google not to examine it.”
- “Australian banks use secure internet connections and my Office is not aware of any instances where banking information has been collected.”
What this means for the Australian Federal Police investigation into the “biggest privacy breach in history” remains to be seen. No doubt the senator will try and spin it in some way.
Conroy was concerned that Google was in fact collecting personally identifiable location-based information, in collecting information regarding Wi-Fi networks. As I have discussed previously in this article, in actual fact the government releases more personally identifiable location-based information than he was accusing Google of collecting. Google certainly has not released any of the information it collected in error.
Hilariously, in the middle of the massive barney he started with Google, he also claimed on radio that Google may have even collected internet banking details. Once again, as discussed here, it was shown that he was completely wrong/stupid/inept/all of the above.
How much more of this incompetent bumbling fool must we endure?