Mass Surveillance This Way Comes! By Brian Simpson

     This article, referenced below, is behind a paywall, as they increasingly are, but I popped down to the local library and read the hard copy: Bo Seo, “Mass Surveillance Just an Act Away.” Australian Financial Review, October 31, 2019, p. 15. The issue is the government’s quest to get enhanced powers to use facial recognition technology. This was done for various sensible activities such as road safety, but behind this was the dark side, the lack of a need for warrants, ministerial discretion and automated decision-making, all of which got canned recently by a bipartisan parliamentary committee. The bills will resurface. They will, if passed, enable the Department of Home Affairs to maintain a centralised data bank of facial images from government sources and identity markers and information. This data can then be used by government departments to commit evil acts … no kidding … it will be used for a wide range of surveillance purposes. But, hey, the elites say, if you have not broken the law, what is there to be afraid of? That is fine if one is willing to throw away the common law protections that developed over the centuries, which the modern Western technocratic state, soon to be totalitarian, is only too willing to do.
  https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/mass-surveillance-the-facial-recognition-bill-explained-20191029-p5358t

     Freedom fighters, keep your eyes on this one, it will bob up again.