Public Demands Accountability for Police Officers
The mid-1990s Royal Commission into the NSW Police Service uncovered evidence of entrenched corruption, which included state law enforcement officers selling heroin out the back of police stations, involved in running then illegal sex work services and trading in child pornography....
Technology May Be the Key to Predicting Crime and Efficiently Allocating Resources
Technology is changing our lives in some of the most significant ways. And while it might sound like something out of a sci-fi movie, a new Artificial Intelligence (AI) model that has been tested across eight cities in the United...
A Misuse of the Law to Silence Me: Vegan Activist Tash Peterson on Liquor Premises Ban
The disruptive protests of animal rights activist Tash Peterson have caused such a stir in her home state of Western Australia over the last three years, that WA police recently banned her from all licensed premises, issuing a barring notice under...
How Can I Get Abusive Content Removed from the Internet?
Federal laws which came into effect earlier this year give the Australian eSafety Commissioner sweeping powers to gather information about those who post abusive, abhorrent or threatening content - including the identities behind pseudonyms - and compel internet companies to...
UN Inspection Body Visit Should Spur Action on Detainee Abuse, Says Shoebridge
Then attorney general George Brandis ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture, otherwise known as the OPCAT, on 15 December 2017, which means our nation agreed to establish a UN governed system of independent bodies to inspect Australia’s places of...
“Police Powers Are Bleeding Out”: Redfern Legal Centre’s Sam Lee on the Strip Search Class Action
The long-awaited strip search class action was filed in the Common Law Division of the NSW Supreme Court on 21 July. The proceedings will cover all music festival attendees, who’ve registered and been subjected to a suspect strip search at events...
The Laws Relating to Cyber Bullying and Online Abuse in Australia
The Online Safety Act 2021 (Cth) was passed by the Australian Parliament on 23 June 2021 and came into effect on 23 January 2022. The second reading speeches to the Act makes clear that its objectives include: Protecting Australian adults...
“The Time Has Come for Full Disclosure”: Former Senator Rex Patrick on the Timor-Leste Files
Former Senator Rex Patrick was standing outside Room 5.3 of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal on 28 July, while proceedings were taking place inside, as, despite his having initiated the case being heard, he wasn’t permitted to enter due to the secrecy...
Big Australian Retailers Sprung Collecting Customer’s Faceprints
In a move right out of former Liberal home affairs minister Peter Dutton’s playbook, a number of Australian retailers were recently found to be utilising biometric facial recognition technology to capture digital “faceprints” of customers that can be matched to...
Australian Imams Call Out Beijing’s Oppression of the Uyghur People
The Australian National Imams Council (ANIC) released a statement last Friday, calling out the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) decades-long persecution of the Uyghur people in their homelands, which has only been intensifying over recent years. The Uyghurs are a Central Asian...
