Privacy Law is a statute that mandates people having personal information about individuals that can be plausibly identified to withhold their opinions concerning the person in question. The Australian government controls the handling of private information using the Privacy Act 1988 which includes thirteen privacy principles (OAIC.gov.au, 2019). The provisions set out the rights, obligations, and standards that regulate the conduct of the people that handle, hold, use, access, or correct sensitive personal data.

The tenets of the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) include personal information used in medical research, tax file numbers, and credit reporting provisions. Other legislation that incorporate the Privacy Act include anti-money laundering, telecommunications, personal property security, data matching, and criminal records regulations (OAIC.gov.au, 2019). Also, the law requires the eHealth system, Medicare and Pharmaceutical to maintain client confidentiality.

However, the dynamicity of technology is rapidly changing the definition and application of Privacy Law because tech-savvy users have their intimate, personal, and private details plastered all over social media sites. Besides, some narcissists capture every moment of their lives and share photographs, videos, and location details with internet users. As a result, the perennial habit of hyper-sharing is rapidly diffusing across the mainstream society and people are feeling more at ease to share by example.

On the societal level, changes need to be driven for people to protect and respect private information in whichever platform including the social media and other internet-based applications. These changes at the societal level should be propagated by politicians, leaders, and major technology companies, and the public. For example, people should be informed about the personal information being gathered, what will be shared, and it will be used. For example, companies or organizations that collect and store private information should inform people whether they are using to follow their movement or manipulate them with political propaganda. That is, people have the right to transparency when the public or private organization decides to collect private information about them. There are cases where these companies have misused private information by sharing them with advertisers.

In my opinion, I read from CNBC.com (2018) on what Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook CEO, has said about privacy for 15 years. Apparently, Facebook request users to share private information including their current location but do not promise to protect the information. However, Facebook’s behavior does not conform to the 13 Australian Privacy Principles (OAIC. Gov.au , 2019). For example, one of the principles does allow organization collects personal information unless the information is reasonably necessary. For example, obtaining a person’s exact location, full names, phone numbers, emails, and name of a relative is not reasonably needed for a user to use Facebook’s social media platform to chat with other people.  Besides, Facebook is not transparent when collecting the personal information of its users. The social media platform does not redirect its user to its privacy policy. Hence, Facebook should create a more comprehensive privacy policy and educate its users about it.

In conclusion, the Privacy Law sets out the elements of handling, holding, and using private information by individuals and private and public institutions. The legislation applies in medical research, pharmaceutical benefits scheme, eHealth system, criminal records, and many others. Therefore, people collecting personal information of identifiable people should demonstrate transparency during the data gathering process. Besides, the information should be used within the privacy jurisdictions stipulated by the Privacy Act of 1988.

REFERENCES

CNBC. (2019). Mark Zuckerberg has been talking about privacy for 15 years — here’s almost

everything he’s said. Retrieved from https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/21/facebook-ceo-mark-zuckerbergs-statements-on-privacy-2003-2018.html

Oaic.gov.au. (2019). Privacy law| Office of the Australian Information Commissioner – OAIC.

Retrieved from https://www.oaic.gov.au/privacy-law/