Microsoft to invest $5b in Aussie datacentres & create Cyber Shield with Signals Directorate

Microsoft has announced a "collaboration" with the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) on something they're calling the Microsoft-Australian Signals Directorate Cyber Shield (MACS). According to the vague press release, the Cyber Shield "builds on the longstanding partnership between Microsoft and the Australian Government, where the exchange of cyber threat information has led to better protection for Australian residents, businesses and government entities. The collaboration will enhance the government and Microsoft's joint capability to identify, prevent and respond to cyber threats, which are growing in both frequency and severity". Microsoft will also "invest A$5 billion in expanding its hyperscale cloud computing and AI infrastructure in Australia over the next two years" and work with "TAFE NSW towards establishing a Microsoft Datacentre Academy in Australia".

Privacy commissioner hasn't handed out a single data breaches fine

According to an "exchange" between Greens Senator David Shoebridge and Australia's information and privacy commissioner Angelene Falk during Senate estimates yesterday, it was revealed (Crikey link, could be paywalled) that "the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) had received 1,748 reports of notifiable data breaches over the past two financial years". Despite all those breaches, there hasn't been a single fine handed out by the OAIC for a data breach, which apparently, is a "regulatory strategy" to encourage "the resolution of investigations by means other than penalties". Falk also mentioned that investigations into the Optus, Medibank, Latitude and Australian Clinical Labs data breaches will be completed "shortly".

AFP used PimEyes and FaceCheck.ID without permission

Thanks to The Guardian/Ariel Bogle's FOI request, we know that the Australian Federal Police used the website PimEyes and FaceCheck.ID regularly between the 1st of January and 4th of August 2023. These are sites where you upload a photo of someone and it tells you if images of that person exist elsewhere on the internet. It can then be used to identify someone or learn more about them. It's not surprising that the AFP would do this, I'm sure there's loads of people they'd love to identity, but the problem is nobody at the AFP or similar levels of law enforcement have reviewed these platforms to check if 1. it actually works and 2. what happens to the data uploaded. The AFP's leadership "was not aware of these uses until Guardian Australia's FOI request".

It's very easy to buy GitHub stars and Product Hunt upvotes

Wired has a story about an "ecosystem of online stores and chat groups openly sell GitHub stars" and "upvotes for projects listed on Product Hunt". For those unaware, GitHub stars are kinda like favourites. The more stars a project has, theoretically, the more people like it and find it useful. People looking to turn their open source project into a business (i.e: the code is free but you offer it as a SaaS too) try to mislead investors by showing off how many stars their project has, which a dumb investor could interpret as "wow this super popular", not knowing a huge amount of those stars were purchased. Ditto Product Hunt, a place where startups (mostly SaaS ones) pat each other on the back.