Face-offin photo row

Premier under fire on privacy

CIVIL libertarians and petitioners have criticised the state government’s response to a call for the retrieval of hundreds of thousands of images of Tasmanians from a dormant national identity database.

In a response this month to a petition tabled in the Legislative Council, Premier Peter Gutwein failed to commit to trying to get back the driver’s licence images.

The petition, signed by about 700 Tasmanians, reflected serious privacy concerns about the photos being uploaded to the National Driver Licence Facial Recognition Solution, which has not yet been ratified by relevant legislation.

More than 430,000 images of Tasmanians were sent to the database in December 2018 in preparation for the roll out of the NDLFRS, which is aimed at cracking down on identity fraud.

But federal legislation on the issue was blocked last year by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which said it lacked safeguards to protect people’ s privacy.

Mr Gut we in, in the government’ s response to the Legislative Council, wrote that the ownership and authorisation of access to Tasmanian images and associated data remained with Tasmania’s Department of State Growth.

He said he understood the federal government was proposing to introduce legislation this year to support the use of face-matching services.

In dependent MP Meg Webb said the government’ s position was out of touch.

“The priority must be the protection of all Tasmanians’ sensitive and personal data ,’’ Ms Webb said.

Electronic Frontiers Australia spokesman Justin Warren said it was “baffling” the state had handed over the data without the proper legislation.