EFA : Electronic Frontiers Australia

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EFA : Electronic Frontiers Australia

Promoting and protecting digital rights in Australia since 1994. Support us at efa.org.au/donate or buy our merch at https://www.redbubble.com/people/efau/shop

12/06/2026

Judge denies Meta and Google new trial

A California state court judge has rejected requests by Meta and Google's YouTube for a new trial, after a jury found both companies liable for designing social media platforms that harm young people.

The jury decided Meta and YouTube were negligent in operating their platforms, harming a 20-year-old plaintiff named Kaley, and assigned Meta 70 percent of the responsibility compared to 30 percent for YouTube.

Judge Carolyn Kuhl dismissed the argument that Section 230 shields the companies, writing the law does not cover their design choices. Both Meta and Google said they plan to appeal. Time to re-fill that pop corn.....

Link to article in the comments.

05/05/2026

04 May 2026 was World Press Freedom Day.

EFA supports press freedom and remains concerned that the Australian government, and others, continue to make or amend laws that impinge or reduce freedom of the press to reduce transparency, accountability and truth.

Dr Julian Watchorn, EFA Vice Chair, shares his thoughts in an EFA blog.

Link to the blog is in the comments.

02/05/2026

Ooops!!!

Claude AI agent wipes firm’s database in 9 seconds, confesses: “I violated every principle I was given”

https://cybernews.com/ai-news/claude-ai-deletes-car-rental-database/

25/04/2026

Today is World Intellectual Property Day 2026.

The protection of copyright is critical in Australia right now due to the foisting/uptake (depending upon your perspective) of rapid artificial intelligence (AI) development, digital economic growth, and the need to maintain a fair environment for creators.

Want to know more? Read this article from Dr Julian Watchorn, Vice Chair of EFA. The link is in the comments.

20/04/2026

How does BigTech stack the deck against civil society groups and other activists seeking to slow down and more closely examine the roll out of AI and the data centres needed to run it?

Here’s a significant example. Microsoft and other US tech companies successfully lobbied the EU to hide the environmental toll of their data centers, report Nico Schmidt and Ella Joyner, investigative journalists. Investigate Europe in collaboration with Tech Policy Press publish the article below.

Excluding Antarctica, Australia is the driest continent on the planet. Our struggle with water - not having enough (or having too much) - is embodied into our culture, our art, our science and our society from the time of First Nations peoples until today.

Early signals show AI data centres are harmful to the environment and dramatically impact water supplies and liveability especially for people who have the misfortune of having a data centre being built across the road from where they live.

Let's not "move fast and break things" or "move at the speed of technology" - let's slow this down and really think through the societal and environmental impacts of AI at scale and the proliferation of data centres.

Link to article is in the comments.

Say no to BigTech exceptionalism

Slow down AI

Digital rights

Neo-luddism is not what you think it is.

17/04/2026

FOI docs reveal Information Commissioner’s concerns over Age Assurance Technology Trial

Electronic Frontiers Australia chair says, “These FOI documents validate EFA’s position and its strong concerns about misleading privacy claims made by the AATT.”

Article link is in the comments.

16/04/2026

Want to get the weekend's reading sorted? Start with this!

Stanford University's AI Index Report for 2026 is out, and very well worth a browse or a deep dive.

Here's what piqued EFA's attention so far:

* Responsible AI is not keeping pace with AI capability, with safety benchmarks lagging and incidents rising sharply. (No surprises here).

* AI sovereignty is becoming a defining feature of national policy, but capabilities remain uneven.

* AI experts and the public have very different perspectives on the technology’s future, and global trust in institutions to manage AI is poor (Again, no surprises here).

The link to the report is in the comments.

25/03/2026

Big Tech has its first Big To***co moment, finally.

Could this be a death knell for algorithmic behavioural manipulation and surveillance based personal data extraction?

It's too soon to tell. Meta will likely appeal the decision but personally I am optimistic about future cases against Meta and the chances for their success.

I will be watching space closely. So should you. Grab your pop corn and 3D glasses .

Personally, as a digital rights advocate and life long privacy nerd I will be having a quiet celebratory beverage.

And yes, the court penalty is pocket change to the Zuck but given there is a conga line of other similar court cases in train this might get his attention.

Link is in the comments.

24/03/2026

Good friends of EFA - Digital Rights Watch - are hosting an event this Monday 30/03/2026. You can attend in person or on-line. DRW put on great events, we encourage you to attend.

Link is in the comments.

11/03/2026

Civil society and academia opposition is building on proposed restrictions on the use of VPNs as part of emerging age verification requirements around the world.

Around 400 security and privacy experts have signed on to an open letter and are calling on lawmakers to halt the deployment of mandatory age verification until there is solid evidence on feasibility and impact.

The signatories of the open letter warn that regulations intended to protect children online could ultimately cause "more harm than good" - to all of us. The open letter is in the comments.

John Pane, Chair of Electronic Frontiers Australia shared his views on this issue with Chiara Castro writing for TechRadar. Article is the comments.

Image: Definitely not an NSA data centre......

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PO Box 16, Suite 46491 Nobby Beach
Miami, QLD
4218

Website

https://efa.org.au/

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