Hill stance ‘slap in face’

TOWNSVILLE Mayor Jenny Hill has been accused of standing in the way of efforts to reopen the economy by refusing to download the Federal Government’s COVIDSAFE app.

But Cr Hill is standing by comments that an Australian provider, rather than Us-based Amazon, should have been used and is also concerned about Amazon’s poor record of cyber security.

The Government released the app on Sunday. It is designed to protect people by providing early notifications of contact with potential COVID-19 carriers.

In a letter to the Bulletin, Townsville anaesthetist Brett Segal said it “beggars belief” the Mayor would not use the app because the data was being held by a foreign-owned company. Dr Segal said her “leftfield decision” was a “slap in the face” to essential service workers.

“Our community looks to our civic leaders for guidance; the same community whose people have either lost their jobs or have been furloughed to help suppress the pandemic,” Dr Segal said.

“For the leader of North Queensland’s premier city to not endorse this app means she is not committed to getting our economy restarted and for it to not be suspended due to a second wave of transmission.”

Earlier this week, Cr Hill told the Bulletin she would not download the app because anything stored by Amazon offshore she did not support.

Yesterday, Cr Hill said she was still not convinced Amazon was “the best way to go” and questioned why an Australian provider was not being used.

“I read our audit and risk reports around cybersecurity and I’m very mindful about keeping our residents’ data safe,” she said.

“I’m not convinced this is the best way to go.

“At a time when we are talking about self-sufficiency, why are we using an Americanbased multinational conglomerate?”

A Federal Department of Health spokesman said Amazon was using its AWS data centre in Australia, which was certified to the “protected level” under the Government’s Protective Security Framework and was already in use by the Government, retailers, airlines and banks.

The spokesman said AWS was selected on the basis of capability, scalability and value in implementing the proposed solution.

“Keeping Australian data in Australia will be guaranteed through a determination through the Biosecurity Act and legislation,” the spokesman said.

“It will be a criminal offence to transfer data to any country other than Australia. A penalty of imprisonment for five years and/or 300 penalty units ($63,000) could apply to breaches of the direction.”