Misuse worry over people’s contact details

James Kitto | Mercury Newspaper | October 28, 2020  

QUESTIONS have been asked of the state government about how Tasmanians’ personal information is being protected from businesses gathering COVID contact tracing data.

It comes as independent MLC Meg Webb said she was shocked to receive a marketing message from a Hobart restaurant the day after dining there and providing her contact details.

“I was extremely surprised when I received a promotional email from the venue the next day,” Ms Webb said.

“At the time of providing my contact details, I specifically noted there was no written information on the form about authorisation of other possible use of my contact details .”

Ms Webb said the state government needed to step in and help prevent businesses from misusing the personal information of Tasmanians.

“What greatly concerns me is that if people start receiving regular promotional offerings to their inbox or smart phone, they may become annoyed and stop providing the correct information,” she said.

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner website states some public health Orders and Directions specifically prohibit secondary use and disclosure of customer contact details.

“It is not appropriate to use this information for any other purposes such as direct marketing , particularly as customers are legally required to provide this information for contact tracing purposes in order to access venues like cafes and restaurants,” the website reads. Public accountability expert Adjunct Associate Professor in Law at the University of Tasmania Rick Snell said he was surprised to hear of a business using customer information as a marketing tool.

“It seems to me that the system has to have safeguards in place. I’d be surprised if there weren’t , and that this is just the case of one business getting it wrong,” he said.

Tasmanian director of Public Health Mark Veitch said contact tracing for all Tasmanian venues should have been mandated at the start of the pandemic.

“We didn’t go down the path of mandating it in the first instance but we think in the benefit of hindsight that we should have made that request of businesses when they first opened up,” he said.

Tasmanian app developer Darren Alexander said a platform he initially created as a restaurant booking app could be a solution to ensure there is accurate contact tracing for venues and authorities to use.

His Book Eat Safe app allows users to book a table using information they enter into the platform like they would with Uber.

He said entering the information of fellow diners was done by the app linking with the user’s phone contacts.

Copyright © 2020 News Pty Limited