Google balloons coming to Qld; Nationals Senator "ashamed" of Coalition NBN; Veterans' Affairs ordered to apologise for privacy breach

Google will soon begin a trial of its balloon-based internet connectivity plan, Project Loon, in Queensland.

The trial, being conducted in partnership with Telstra and taking place in December, will see Google fly 20 of its internet-broadcasting balloons in western Queensland, the Guardian reported.

Project Loon is intended to be “a network of balloons travelling on the edge of space” that allows people on the ground - particularly in remote and rural areas - to connect to the internet.

Loon balloons float about 20 km above the Earth in the stratosphere, providing LTE connectivity to a ground area about 40 km in diameter.

As part of the Project Loon trial, Telstra will provide access to wireless spectrum and terrestrial base stations, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Should Project Loon progress to a commercial service, Google plans to share revenue from the project with telecom providers, according to the WSJ.

“We partner with telcos in every country we roll out in,” the WSJ quoted Mike Cassidy, vice president of Project Loon, as saying. “The telcos are trying to reach their rural population that they can’t reach today. The telco does the billing for the customer, they own the customer, they do the customer support. They market the service to the customer.”

“We ask, ‘What if we put the cell towers up in the sky and share the revenue with you?’ They say, ‘sounds great,’ and it’s working really well,” Cassidy was quoted as saying.

Nationals Senator “ashamed” of Coalition NBN

Nationals Senator Barry O’Sullivan has blasted the Coalition’s own broadband policy, saying he is “ashamed” and “embarrassed” about the broadband services that will be offered to parts of western Queensland under the Coalition’s NBN plan.

According to The Age, O’Sullivan is angry that the Diamantina and Barcoo shires in western Queensland will not receive optic-fibre connectivity under the NBN and will instead be relegated to receiving a satellite-only service.

"It’s a shame on our nation," The Age quoted O’Sullivan as saying. "I'm embarrassed to be a part of a party whose government would allow this to continue.”

O’Sullivan reportedly complained that poor internet connectivity in areas of western Queensland was hampering medical services, education and businesses.

"I think [Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull] should roll his swag out and run his ministry from out here for a month and then I think Malcolm will change his opinion,” O’Sullivan reportedly said.

"Let’s see how he goes and hope that he doesn’t need phone service or internet, and he’ll want to hope he doesn’t need medical services.”

A spokesperson for Turnbull said the Diamantina and Barcoo shires were restricted to satellite-only services because of the cost requirements of the NBN, according to The Age.

The ABC quoted O’Sullivan as saying: "I am happy to say I am ashamed and I intend to go back and make a hell a lot of noise up and down the corridors at Canberra to try and get a resolution.”

O’Sullivan said he would push for federal funds to upgrade telecommunications infrastructure for remote areas, the ABC reported.

Veterans’ Affairs ordered to apologise for privacy breach

Privacy Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim has demanded that the Department of Veterans’ Affairs apologise to a former Australian Defence Force (ADF) member after it disclosed his personal information.

In November 2011, the man in question claimed that Veterans’ Affairs breached the Privacy Act by disclosing his personal information to:

• an ADF Senior Medical Officer
• the Head of Joint Health Command in the Department of Defence
• the Chief of Air Force

Pilgrim found that in each of the three cases, Veterans’ Affairs breached Information Privacy Principle (IPP) 11.1.

“The Department of Veterans’ Affairs … interfered with the complainant’s privacy by disclosing his personal information, in breach of [IPP 11.1] of the Privacy Act 1988,” Pilgrim wrote in a report documenting his findings.

Pilgrim wrote that the Privacy Act entitles him to declare that “the complainant is entitled to a payment of compensation for ‘any loss or damage suffered by reason of’ the interference with privacy”.

However, since the complainant is seeking an apology, Pilgrim did not consider whether compensation would be warranted.

“I declare … that … the Department shall apologise in writing to the complainant within two weeks of this determination,” Pilgrim wrote.

Pilgrim also ordered a review of the management of privacy complaints within the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.

Image courtesy iLighter under CC