COVID-19 – Page 2 – Cyber Law Watch

#WashYourCyberHands

May 07 2020

There has never been a better time to #WashYourCyberHands.

The COVID-19 pandemic has provided the perfect breeding ground for cyber criminals to capitalise on, and exploit the outbreak of the virus to steal data, commit fraud and circulate online scams. Law enforcement agencies and the cybersecurity industry have seen an increase in the number of targeted cyberattacks by criminals since the outbreak began.

INTERPOL has announced it is launching a global campaign to raise awareness about the top coronavirus related cyber threats throughout the globe. The campaign will provide basic cyber hygiene advice to businesses and individuals on how to ‘wash your cyber hands’ and protect systems and data from cyber threats.

Privacy Professionals download COVIDSafe App

May 06 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Rob Pulham, Michelle Aggromito and Allison Wallace

A number of legal professionals, with significant experience in the field of privacy law, have signed an open letter to encourage individuals to download the Commonwealth Government’s COVIDSafe App.

Among the privacy lawyers are members of K&L Gates own Australian privacy team (and the authors of this blog post) Cameron Abbott, Rob Pulham, Warwick Andersen, Michelle Aggromito and Allison Wallace.

The open letter is signed by members in their personal capacity, and signals that people who care about privacy a lot can still think that supporting the health and economic objectives of the App is more important at this time.

As at the date of this post, more than 5 million people have downloaded the App, with more needed to reach the Commonwealth Government’s target of 40% of the Australian population.

It’s Trace Time! The COVIDSafe App is open for business – Part II

Apr 28 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Rob Pulham and Michelle Aggromito

In Part I of this blog, we briefly touched on some of the safeguards that the Commonwealth Government has indicated that they will implement to address privacy concerns. Those proposed new safeguards are intended to satisfy many of the privacy concerns. However, there are additional safeguards that have been implemented in connection with the functionality of the App, which we focus on in Part II here.

It’s Trace Time! The COVIDSafe App is open for business – Part I

Apr 27 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Rob Pulham and Michelle Aggromito

The Commonwealth Government released its COVIDSafe App for download at 6.00pm AEST on Sunday 26 April, and it surpassed 1.13 million downloads within the first 12 hours. This was far greater than expectations, with Health Minister Greg Hunt commenting that, at best, the hope was that “we might get to 1 million in five days.”

“This is a public health app, it’s not a surveillance app”: Review finds “nothing particularly disturbing” about the Federal Government’s coronavirus tracing app

Apr 23 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Rob Pulham, Michelle Aggromito and Rebecca Gill

The Federal Government’s coronavirus tracing app has raised some privacy concerns amongst the Australian public. Even some of our government Ministers have ruled out downloading the app due to such concerns! However, the independent cyber security body tasked with reviewing the app has said that it has found no major concerns with it.

Apr 21 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Rob Pulham and Max Evans

We previously blogged about the plethora of Asian countries who are using telecommunications networks, smart phone applications and messaging services to inform, track and monitor individuals who may have contracted COVID-19. It appears that Australia’s eyes are on similar technology opportunities, as according to an article from the SMH, the Federal Government will ask Australians “within weeks” to opt in and sign up for a mobile application that uses tracking data to alert individuals as to their risks of contracting COVID-19.

According to the article, the relevant application will monitor the movements of participants to inform individuals whether they have been close to someone already infected with COVID-19. The application also has the functionality to enable someone who has contracted the virus to notify health authorities and ensure that an alert is sent to anyone he or she has been in contact with over the previous 24 hours. Both of these processes are part of what is known as “contact tracing”.

Apr 21 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Rob Pulham, Michelle Aggromito and Rebecca Gill

As noted in part I of this blog, various reports have highlighted the significant increase in phishing scams in light of the global COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, there has been an increase in coronavirus-related emails and SMS messages that are embedded with malicious links or documents, created for the purposes of stealing personal information (among other things), usually for financial gain. In order to stop the spread (pardon the pun) of such virus-inspired phishing scams, the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) has confirmed that it has launched an offensive against malicious attackers located offshore.

Apr 08 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Rob Pulham, Michelle Aggromito and Rebecca Gill

In part 1 of this blog, we highlighted the increase in phishing scams in light of the global COVID-19 pandemic. In this part 2, we discuss some practical tips that organisations can implement to mitigate the heightened risks of falling prey to such scams.

So, where to begin? You may have seen a recently published alert on the K&L Gates Hub: Responding to COVID-19 series, which provides high level ideas and tips for organisations when implementing remote working procedures for their employees. In particular, organisations should consider implementing:

Mar 30 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, and Max Evans

As the world grinds to a halt following the dispersion of COVID-19 and businesses around the globe experience a significant downturn, more and more businesses are turning towards their Business Continuity Plan (BCP) in order to mitigate the potential impacts of this worldwide emergency on business sustainability. However, a key aspect of BCP’s is that they encapsulate the full scale of collateral issues that may arise from such an emergency.

From a technology perspective, BCP’s need to consider access. This issue is twofold: being access to premises in which businesses operate in order to correct system defects and system outages, as well as access to external premises that provide technology services such as data storage or data security services.

Mar 26 2020

By Cameron Abbott, Warwick Andersen, Rob Pulham and Max Evans

As the world grinds to a halt following the perpetuation of COVID-19, more and more businesses have turned to remote work arrangements. This has led to a sharp rise in the use of videoconferencing technology Zoom. However, as the Australian Financial Review notes, flawed data security and privacy practices mean that the use of Zoom could be disastrous for corporate and personal privacy.

Concerns surrounding the use of Zoom arose earlier this year, with critical security vulnerabilities enabling hackers to predict Meeting ID’s and therefore join active meetings, and also allowing any website to forcibly join a user to a Zoom call with their video camera activated and without the user’s permission. Whilst a number of these errors were patched up, as the article notes, Zoom refused to disable the ability for hackers to forcibly join to a call anyone visiting a malicious site, raising security red flags and undermining public confidence in Zoom’s attitude towards data security. A strange response given that part of its attraction had been a perceived stronger approach to security.

Tag:COVID-19

#WashYourCyberHands

Privacy Professionals download COVIDSafe App

It’s Trace Time! The COVIDSafe App is open for business – Part II

It’s Trace Time! The COVIDSafe App is open for business – Part I

“This is a public health app, it’s not a surveillance app”: Review finds “nothing particularly disturbing” about the Federal Government’s coronavirus tracing app

Let’s Track This Through: Tracking Data at the Epicentre of Efforts to Stop COVID Outbreak as Federal Government Considers Implementing Opt-In Mobile Application

A phishing pandemic (and offensive): Part III

A phishing pandemic – Part II

Forgotten Issues: What Business Continuity Planning in the COVID-19 Era Isn’t Contemplating

Not So Zoomy: Use of Videoconferencing Technology “Zoom” on the Rise, but Privacy and Data Security Inadequacies suggest Users should Tread Carefully