Australia: A Government Watch Dog with Two Companies to Monitor
December 11, 2018
Australia has become the first country to pass a law requiring that encrypted messages have to be unlocked for law enforcement. That means WhatsApp and a gaggle of other secret messaging apps.
Now Australia has another interesting idea, reported by Business Daily in Africa. The Australian government wants a regulator to monitor Facebook and Google. According to the report I saw:
Australia’s competition watchdog on Monday [December 10, 2018] recommended tougher scrutiny and a new regulatory body to check the dominance of tech giants Facebook Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google in the country’s online advertising and news markets.
The source document cited a familiar refrain:
The two firms have already promised to do more to tackle the spread of fake news and, in submissions to the ACCC, said they provided users access to global news articles while providing advertisers a cheap way of reaching big audiences.
Australia is a member of Five Eyes, and the country may be setting a path which Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and the US may follow.
In short, the good old days of Wild West digital services may find the prairie managed in part by barbed wire fences, gates, and folks with badges and six shooters and maybe an automatic weapon too.
Stephen E Arnold, December 11, 2018
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