A “digital doppelganger” whose authorities information have been repeatedly combined up had his privateness breached by Companies Australia, Australia’s privateness commissioner has discovered.
Companies Australia has been ordered to pay $10,000 to an Australian man, dubbed “ATQ”, apologise and overview how its insurance policies led the company to commit “severe and repeated interferences with privateness” over a six-year interval.
The breaches relate to ATQ’s information being repeatedly combined up — or “intertwined” — with different people with the identical title and start date. In 2011, the federal authorities estimated there have been tons of of Australian “digital doppelgangers”.
Australian privateness commissioner Carly Sort discovered that Companies Australia broke numerous Australia’s privateness rules, together with by intertwining ATQ’s delicate info with others, disclosing his private info with out authorisation, and failing to make sure info was up-to-date.
After submitting a criticism in 2019 about two situations the place his Medicare information had been up to date with another person’s deal with — which was resolved with an assurance it wouldn’t occur once more — ATQ filed one other criticism in 2022 about two additional incidents.
ATQ had been wrongly advised his household was about to achieve the Medicare security internet threshold as a result of one other individual’s Medicare information had been incorrectly attributed to his account. Then, ATQ discovered that his COVID-19 and influenza vaccine information had been assigned to a different particular person’s Medicare document.
ATQ submitted he had been capable of entry “delicate info of one other buyer of the respondent, together with their title, date of start, addresses, cell phone quantity, credit score historical past and place of employment”, and advised that the opposite particular person would be capable to entry his.
ATQ sought near $300,000, comprising $200,000 for grief and misery, $50,629 for “non-economic loss, related along with his time coping with this matter”, and $16,879 for the prices related to altering his title.
Whereas ATQ didn’t present any proof of psychological harm or administrative prices for a reputation change, Sort awarded $10,000 for the misery.
“The inadequacy of the steps taken by the respondent to guard the complainant’s private info from additional unauthorised entry and disclosure has induced the complainant to expertise persevering with emotions of stress,” Sort wrote. She additionally famous that ATQ was in a susceptible place as a result of he has no various to coping with Companies Australia.
Sort wrote on LinkedIn that the novelty of “digital doppelgangers” shouldn’t obscure the potential for hurt: “Though solely a small subset of Australians could also be affected, the potential hurt is important, and was on the forefront of my thoughts in making this willpower,” she mentioned.
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