On 23 October 2014 the Federal Court of Australia handed down a decision that dealt with the downloading of software by an employee immediately before his departure from that firm and his taking up employment with a competitor.

Despite the court’s finding that the employee received no material benefit from use of the information, and his new employer had no access to the information, significant monetary compensation was payable by the employee.  The facts are as follows.

Intellectual property rights include patents, trade marks and copyright. The Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) grants exclusive rights in the copyright owner, including the right to use, reproduce and publish works. Copyright exists in original works, such as computer programs.

APRA Ltd v Jain (1990) 26 FCR 53

University of NSW v Moorhouse [1975] HCA 26

Big data is a term used to describe the exponential growth and availability of data, both structured and unstructured (1). In terms of health care, big data represents all of the data which has been collected on relevant multiple databases. Click here to read more.

Two recent cases before the Australian Privacy Commissioner (Commissioner) serve as a reminder to organisations of the importance of keeping personal information of clients secure and adequately disposing of information that is no longer in use.

The Personal Property Securities Act 2009 (PPSA) required a review of the operations of the Act to be undertaken within 3 years of its implementation.  The review recognised that there were various aspects of the legislation that would need time to work their way into the corporate consciousness of Australian businesses and an assessment of industry understanding of the PPSA was an appropriate mechanism to ensure compliance and ongoing protection.

Disclosure documents need to be updated annually and businesses must provide their current information by the end of October 2013. While many franchisors tend to wait until the last minute to finalise the update, in 2013, there are a few issues to be aware of - which could mean you start this job earlier than usual.

The High Court’s recent decision in Sidhu v Van Dyke means that if you have relied on a promise and the other party has resiled from that promise to your detriment, you will need to prove that you relied on that promise and suffered a loss as a result.

Australian privacy rights are regulated by Commonwealth State and Territory legislation and the laws protecting confidential information under the common law. Australian privacy laws govern the collection, use and disclosure of “personal information”.

If your business or organisation has a turnover greater than 3 million per year the significant changes that were made to the Australian Privacy Act on 12 March 2014 are likely to apply to your organisation. A compliance program should be implemented to ensure any personal information that is used or disclosed by the organisation is appropriately protected.

The reforms implemented 13 new Australian Privacy Principals, with substantial changes being made to the principles surrounding direct marketing and cross border disclosure of information.  Additional changes to the Act implement changes to the credit reporting regime that will be particularly relevant to insurers if they undertake online credit reference checks on insureds or other individuals.

If your business collects, uses or discloses personal information, maintains a client or customer database or uses a cloud computer system, changes to the laws that commenced on 12 March 2014 are relevant to you.