telecommunications service providers

Privacy Commissioner investigates alleged sale of telco customer information

Nov 21 2016

Australia’s Information and Privacy Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim is making enquiries into allegations that the personal information of customers of three Australian telcos is being sold online.

Fairfax uncovered an alleged rort involving ‘corrupt insiders’ at the offshore call centres of Telstra, Optus and Vodafone, which has allegedly seen details including customers’ addresses, dates of birth and billing statements leaked to at least one private company in India, which is then allegedly selling the information for up to $1000.

Commissioner Pilgrim has said in a statement that he is working to determine what further action may need to be taken.

All three telcos have also released statements, reiterating that they take the privacy of their customers seriously. Vodafone and Optus have met with the AFP, which has now passed the matter on to Indian authorities.

New Data Retention Laws Implementation Deadline

Oct 12 2015

By Cameron Abbott and Melanie Long

From 13 October 2015, telecommunications service providers that use communications infrastructure in Australia to provide any of their services may be required to retain and secure certain data for two years. The new obligations under the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Amendment (Data Retention) Act 2015 (Cth) apply to licensed carriers, carriage service providers and internet service providers. However, some services are specifically excluded including, for example, broadcasting services. The data retention obligations will apply regardless of the size of the company and/or its customer base.

Broadly, the type of data that must be retained includes:

the source and destination of a communication
the date, time and duration of a communication
communication type
location of communications equipment.

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