Published on the 26/03/2025 | Written by Newsdesk

AppWrap aims to help you keep up to date with an easy to read collection of news and snippets published by other leading tech media publications that we trust. AppWrap March 2025 25.03 The ACS has welcomed tax cuts for tech professionals included in

AppWrap aims to help you keep up to date with an easy to read collection of news and snippets published by other leading tech media publications that we trust.

AppWrap March 2025

25.03 The ACS has welcomed tax cuts for tech professionals included in the Federal Government’s 2025 Budget. The tax relief measures for IT specialists, software engineers, cybersecurity experts and other digital professionals integral to the economy are a ‘positive step towards retaining and attracting tech talent’ and will enable them to invest more in their careers and upskill. However the ACS says it is concerned about the lack of investment and incentives for the private sector around AI.

25.03 The AFP says it accessed the controversial Auror retail surveillance system 365 times in 2024. Auror is currently under investigation by the OAIC, which had previously been looking at the AFP’s use of the system, InformationAge reports. The AFP had paused use of the Kiwi platform, but began reusing it after a privacy impact assessment was completed at the end of 2023.

23.03 Some of Australia’s biggest organisations are scrambling to check their cybersecurity after a hacker claimed to have breached Oracle Cloud and stolen credentials. Infosec company CloudSek says more than six million records, affecting more than 140,000 tenants, have been exfiltrated in the breach, which has been denied by Oracle. AFR says companies including Australia’s biggest banks, Telstra, Optus, Qantas, Woolworths, Coles and the ASX are among those named by the hacker.

21.03 The Consumer Technology Association, whose members include Microsoft, Samsung and Accenture, has joined others in lobbying for the Trump administration to retaliate against Australia for ‘harmful’ foreign tax rules, the Guardian reports. Their comments come as part of a review that will inform the looming retaliatory tariffs.

20.03 Big tech including Apple, Meta, Google, Amazon and X have lodged a formal compliant calling for the Trump administration to target ‘coercive and discriminatory’ Australian media laws. The Computer and Communications Industry Association says the news media bargaining incentive, which includes a levy for digital platforms, is requires US tech companies to subsidise Australian media companies, the Guardian reports.

19.03 Meta is vowing to curb misinformation, disinformation and deepfakes in Australia ahead of the federal elections in May. The company says it is continuing to work with AFP and the Australian Associated Press for fact checking of content across its platforms. Content debunked by fact-checkers will have warning labels attached and distribution in Feed and Explore will be reduced. A new media literacy campaign with AAP will also be run to help Australians ‘critically assess’ online content.

19.03 Google parent Alphabet is buying cybersecurity company Wiz for $32 billion in its biggest deal ever. The deal will see Wiz become part of the Google Cloud unit. AP says Wiz, which was started five years ago, is on track for an estimated $1 billion in revenue this year. The acquisition comes as Google faces a potential breakup of its internet empire and at a time when the Trump administration has been inserting itself into major deals such as the TikTok sale.

19.03 Meta is fighting to shut down a memoir from Kiwi whistle-blower and former Facebook executive Sarah Wynn-Williams. An emergency arbitration ruling this month saw Wynn-Williams ordered to temporarily stop personally promoting or distributing copies of the book, but does not stop the publisher or its parent from distributing or promoting Careless People. Slate says the memoir is filled with scandal and a portrait of Facebook’s execs as flawed, awkward and hypocritical humans.

19.03 New Zealand has become a ‘fully playable’ destination in the Minecraft world. Six Kiwi destinations, including the Waitomo Caves, Abel Tasman National Park and Doubtful Sound, are downloadable in a move Tourism NZ says is expected to generate $50m in visitor spend this year. The content coincides with the release of A Minecraft Movie next month.

17.03 A new government-backed digital manufacturing hub has opened at Swinburne University of Technology. The hub aims to drive new AI and IoT-powered digital manufacturing technology, such as digital twins, into manufacturing. It received $5m in funding from the Australian Research Council.

17.03 Microsoft’s AI technology and policy lead for Asia and former Australian CTO, Lee Hicken has been appointed as director of the National AI Centre. Hicken says he will take on the new role in May.

13.03 ASIC is suing FIIG Securities for alleged ‘systemic and prolonged’ cybersecurity failures that enabled the theft of 385Gb of confidential data affecting 18,000 clients. ASIC says FIIG failed to take the appropriate steps, as required by an Australian Financial Services licensee to ensure it had adequate cyber risk management systems in place. Hackers entered the network in May 2023 and were not detected until several weeks later – and a week after it had been notified of potential malicious activity by the ACSC. ASIC says the matter should be a wake-up call to all companies on the danger of neglecting cybersecurity systems.

12.03 Atlassian’s Scott Farquhar is taking over as chair of the Tech Council of Australia. Farquhar, who takes over from Robyn Denholm who has led the organisation since it started in 2021, says there is ‘enormous’ potential to expand advocacy in areas including digital infrastructure and emerging technology.

15.03 OpenAI and Elon Musk have agreed to fast-track a trial over OpenAI’s ‘for profit’ shift, though a decision on whether the case will be by jury or judge-alone has been delayed, Reuters reports. Musk has accused OpenAI, which he cofounded, of straying from its founding mission of developing AI for the good of humanity, rather than corporate profit.

12.03 UK business management software provider The Access Group has snapped up Kiwi job management platforms GeoOp and GeoNext for an undisclosed sum. Geo has a strong Australian presence. The Access Group says the deal will expand its offering in ERP software.

12.03 Spain’s government has approved a draft law imposing fines of up to €35 million for not correctly labelling AI-generated content. EuroNews reports the bill classified incorrect AI labelling as a serious offence with penalties of €7.5m to €35m or 2-7 percent of a companies global turnover. Startups and medium-sized companies could receive lower penalties. The move is designed to limit deepfakes.

11.03 The Australian Financial Complaints Authority is to receive new investigative powers to consider the actions of banks receiving scam transactions. Currently scam victims can only raise a dispute with the AFCA against the bank which sent the consumer’s funds. The changes will come into effect in 12 months, the AFCA says.

07.03 A Melbourne man has been ordered to pay $34,990 in compensation and sentenced to 200 hours of community service after swindling $35,000 using the LabHost cybercrime platform which was marketed as a ‘on-stop-shop’ for phishing, the AFP says.

06.03 Google  received 258 user reports about suspected AI-generated deepfake terrorist or violent extremist material or activity generated by its Gemini AI in the 11 months to the end of Feb 2024. The figures were released by eSafety, which wants tech companies to do more when it comes to tackling terrorist and violent extremist material and activity on their platforms. The eSafety transparency report details what companies are doing to prevent misuse of their platform.

06.03 A ransomware group is threatening to publish data, including valid passport documents, it claims it has stolen from Wendy Wu Tours. CyberDaily reports that the amount of data stolen isn’t revealed on the darknet leak site, but several documents are shared as evidence of the hack including nine scans of passports belonging to residents of Australia, the UK and Germany, and a passenger pre-travel form which includes names, addresses, emergency contacts and frequent flyer numbers.

06.03 The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority has dropped its investigation into the Microsoft-OpenAI partnership, concluding that despite Microsoft investing billions into OpenAI and having exclusive users of some of the company’s AI products, the relationship remains the same as previously and is not subject to review under merger rules, the BBC says.

05.03 Australian organisations will spend almost $6.2 billion on information security and risk management products and services in 2025, an increase of 14.4 percent, year on year, Gartner says.

05.03 Microsoft has launched two sales AI agents to its lineup. Sales Agent and Sales Chat will initially connect to Dynamics 365 and Salesforce. Agent will ‘help grow your pipeline’ researching leads, reaching out to customers and setting up meetings, while Chat will provide insights from CRM data, pitch decks, meetings, emails and the web. Both will be released for public preview in May, Microsoft says.

04.03 Meta, TikTok and Snapchat have hit out at the Albanese government’s plan to exempt YouTube from a social media ban for under-16s, calling the move irrational, indefensible and a ‘sweetheart deal’. The platforms made individual submissions to a government consultation process on the ban arguing Google-owned YouTube should not be treated differently, the Guardian reports.

03.03 Microsoft is cancelling data centre leases and increasing subscription prices for 365 software by up to 45 percent, in a push to make users carry AI costs, Queensland University of Technology and UNSW Sydney academics write in The Conversation. Kevin Witzenberger and Michael Richardson say Microsoft’s moves are indicative of a change in strategy to make AI profitable by shifting the cost onto consumers in ‘non-obvious’ ways.

02.03 Thousands of Microsoft 365 customers have been hit by outages which locked many out of accounts, including Outlook and Azure. Most impact was felt in the US. AP reports Microsoft has identified a potential cause of impact and reverted the suspected code to alleviate impact.

AppWrap February 2025

28.02 Apple is introducing ‘age assurance’ technology which allows parents to input the child’s age without sharing sensitive information like birthdays. Parents can instead share a general ‘age range’ rather than an exact birthday or other identifying information, the Canberra Times reports. The offering comes as the Australian government looks to require social media platforms to take ‘reasonable steps’ to assure the age of users. Social media platforms have previously called for app stores to be required to do the checking.

27.02 The FBI says North Korea was behind the theft of around US$1.5b in Ethereum virtual assets from the Bybit cryptocurrency exchange last month. Some of the assets have been converted into Bitcoin and other virtual assets which have been dispersed across thousands of address on multiple blockchains and are expected to be further laundered and then converted to fiat currency, the FBI says.

28.02 After more than 20 years, Microsoft is shutting down Skype, which it acquired in 2011 for US$8.5b. The company, which says Skype will be retired in May, has been focusing on Microsoft Teams for a number of years.

26.02 Australian IVF company Genea says obtained an interim injunction from the Supreme Court for an injunction to attempt to prevent patient data stolen during a cyberattack earlier this month being disseminated or used. The company says its patient management systems containing patient data were accessed by an unauthorised third party but it is unknown what personal data has been compromised at this time.

25.02 A review of the SAP-based Parliamentary Expense Management System says the benefits used to justify the original $38m expense have only ‘partially’ been realised, with the results not glowing. A two-year uplift is underway to deliver missing functions in a more suer friendly way, InnovationAus reports.

24.02 A report into the ATO’s AI use has raised questions about the design and explainability of the models when flagging individuals for auditing. The Australian National Audit Office audit questions design decisions made around work-related expense models, and the extent to which the ATO can be assured models are free from bias, meet modern data ethics standards and produce easily explainable results, ITnews reports.

24.02 The Australian government is banning products and web services from Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky on all government devices and systems, saying it poses an ‘unacceptable security risk’. Canada, the UK and the US have already announced restrictions on Kaspersky software, leaving just New Zealand remaining of the Five Eyes countries. TechCrunch reports Kaspersky’s spokesperson as saying the company is disappointed with the decision with the directive which was issued without warning.

23.02 Treasurer Jim Chalmers has headed to Washington as Trump and a top trade advisor hit out at countries levying additional taxes on American tech companies. The AFR says Trump’s recent comments accusing overseas governments of plundering the revenues of US tech companies are the strongest signal yet that his administration will retaliate against Australia’s proposed media bargaining code, which would force tech platforms to pay for news or face penalties.

23.02 Hackers have stolen $1.5 billion from Dubai-based crypto platform Bybit’s Ethereum digital wallet in what is believed to be the biggest crypto theft in history. The company, which holds $20b in assets, has told users their funds were ‘safe’ and it will refund those affected, the BBC reports. Hackers ‘exploited’ security features and transferred the money to an unidentified address.

19.02 Microsoft has unveiled a quantum computing chip, which it says could bring quantum computing within years. Microsoft says the Majorana 1 chip, developed after 17 years research, features a ‘breakthrough’ material, the topoconductor, a category of material that can create an entirely new state of matter which isn’t solid, liquid or gas, The Guardian reports. Microsoft says Majorana 1 could potentially fit a million qubits onto a single chip not much bigger than a desktop CPU.The claims have, however, been questioned by some physicists, according to the WSJ.

17.02 The Albanese government is reportedly halting plans to begin designing its News Media Bargaining Incentive policy over fears of a Trump backlash. The SMH (paywalled) says the delay is due to fears the policy will be seen as being unfairly targeted towards the US and result in reciprocal tariffs on Australian exports.

15.02 OpenAI’s board has unanimously rejected a US$97 billion takeover bid by Elon Musk, saying the company is not for sale and dubbing Musk’s bid his ‘latest attempt to disrupt his competition’. AP notes Musk, an early OpenAI investor, sued for breach of contract a year ago over what he called a betrayal of OpenAi’s founding aims as a non-profit. The company is increasingly seeking to capitalise on the commercial success of generative AI, but first needs to buy out the non-profits assets. Musk was attempting to buy the non-profit.

13.02 An AI ‘Bail Assistant’ to promopt the use of correct bail criteria for NSW bail hearings has been paused after preliminary models proved problematic, with the NSW Judicial Commission deciding the assistant wouldn’t make judgements more accurate or restore public confidence. InformationAge reports that the assistant failed to incorporate all of the mandatory tests and was just as difficult for users to navigate.

12.02 Five Russians and the ZServers platform have been sanctioned by the Australian government for enabling the 2022 Medibank data breach. The five individuals are the owner of ZServers and staff members. It is the first time Australia has imposed cyber sanctions against an entity, the Australian Federal Police note.

11.02 Airservices Australia has selected Australia’s AvSoft and Yarra Drones and US-based OneSky to participate in the first round of technical integration with a new data-sharing platform designed to enable drones and other uncrewed craft to be seamlessly incorporated into Australian airspace. The Flight Information Management System will enable Airservices to share flight information between air traffic control, traditional aircraft and uncrewed airspace users, Airservices Australia says.

11.02 The US and UK have both refused to sign a declaration on ‘inclusive and sustainable’ AI at a Paris summit. Sixty other signatories, including Australia and New Zealand, France, China and Canada, signed the document which calls for priorities to ensure AI is open, inclusive, transparent, ethical, safe, secure and trustworthy and sustainable. The Guardian says the UK says the statement has not gone far enough in addressing global governance of AI and its impact on national security, while the US has criticised ‘excessive regulation’ of technology and warned against cooperating with China.

11.02 US vice president JD Vance has criticised Europe’s ‘excessive regulation’ saying it could cripple the AI industry, Time reports.

11.02 Microsoft is adjusting its Office-Teams pricing in an effort to avoid an EU trust fine, Reuters reports. The company has offered to widen the price differential between Office with Teams and without Teams in a move which could help rivals offer their own products at competitive prices and entice users to switch to them.

10.02 University of NSW’s Bronwyn Fox and Australia’s Temporary AI Expert Group are among those who have contributed to a new 300-page International AI Safety Report. The report looks at risks and safety of general-purpose AI risks including large-scale labour market impacts, scams, non-consensual imagery, bias, hacking and loss of control over AI. It notes a need for policymakers and governments to have access to the current scientific understanding on risks and calls for global collaboration to take advantage of opportunities.

08.02 Meta is cutting five percent of its workforce – or potentially around 4,000 jobs – on Monday as part of its performance-based job cuts. Workers in more than a dozen countries outside the US will be notified via work and personal emails and will lose access to systems within an hour of being informed, Business Insider says.

07.02 Some Australian Salesforce staff are among those impacted by the company’s lay-off of 1,000 staff, ARN says. It says it appears some partner account managers have been laid off.

05.02 AirTrunk founder and CEO Robin Khuda’s Khuda Family Foundation has made the largest ever donation to the University of Sydney, donating $100m to fund a 20-year program to create a pathway for Western Sydney girls into Stem careers. The University says it is one of the largest investments in women in Stem globally and will include tutoring, mentoring and university scholarships.

06.02 Workday is laying off 1,750 employees, or around 8.5 percent of its global workforce, saying it is realigning resources in light of increasing demand for AI and its potential to drive growth for Workday, FastCompany reports.

05.02 The Australian Cyber Security Centre has joined other Five Eyes agencies in issuing a ‘publication series’ on securing edge devices after observing an increase in targeted attacks on the devices. It has released four documents, covering mitigation strategies for edge devices for both executives and practitioners, security consideration for edge devices and guidance on digital forensics and protective monitoring specifications for producers of network devices and appliances. “Failing to secure these network perimeters is equivalent to leaving doors open,” ACSC says.

05.02 DeepSeek has been banned from all government devices and systems over security risks. The government says the ban is not due to the app’s Chinese origins but instead because of the ‘unacceptable risk’ it poses to national security, the BBC reports. It is unclear if the ban includes the wider public sector, such as schools.

04.02 Salesforce is cutting 1,000 jobs – while continuing a hiring push for AI-focused sales roles. Bloomberg says it is unclear which divisions will be impacted, and staff will be able to apply for other jobs within Salesforce. The company had nearly 73,000 staff a year ago.

04.02 The government has postponed plans to toughen online safety requirements for platforms until after the election. A government review has recommended penalties of up to five percent of global annual turnover or $50 million, for breaching duty of care but the regime will require legislation, with no timeline to legislate before the election, ABC says. There is also no timeline for revealing whether the fine regime will be adopted.

04.02 Mastercard plans to phase out credit card numbers by 2030, replacing them with tokenisation and biometric authentication. AMP Bank will offer Australia’s first numberless cards with others expected to follow, Queensland University of Technology academics note in The Conversation.

03.02 The ASD’s Australian Cyber Security Centre is warning of email scammers impersonating the ACSC, asking recipients to provide personal information, money or download software. It says organisations or individuals impacted and needing assistance should contact it.

03.02 A crackdown on outsourcing has saved NSW $450m. The bulk of the savings came from controls to limit the number of individual contractors doing the work of public servants, InnovationAus reports.

03.02 The Australian government has renewed its whole-of-government cloud sourcing deal with AWS for a further three years. The first AU$39m agreement, signed in 2019 ended up costing nearly $391m and was expanded in 2022 in a $174m deal. No price was given for the new deal, which the DTA says will reduce time, effort and resources to procure AWS services.

03.02 ASIC has launched an investigation into a December outage of the ASX’s embattled Chess system. The outage saw settlement of trading delayed and was blamed on a network issue that had remained undetected for nearly a decade. It paid out around $1m in rebates for the failure. The ASX says it has been notified of the investigation.

AppWrap January 2025

31.01 The US Justice Department has filed a lawsuit to block HPE’s proposed US$14b acquisition of Juniper Networks, citing antitrust concerns. HPE and Juniper both say they will ‘vigorously defend’ the deal in court.

29.01 The Australian government has granted $6.4 million to the not-for-profit cyber threat intelligence provider CI-ISAC to establish a health-focused cybersecurity threat sharing network. CI-ISAC (Critical Infrastructure – Information Sharing and Analysis Centre) has developed a health cyber sharing network with the funding, aiming to protect Australia’s health sector from cyber threats through enhanced collaboration and intelligence sharing, Australian Cyber Security reports.

29.01 The National Reconstruction Fund has taken a $32m equity investment in medical AI company Harrison.ai. The funding will ensure the company continues to base its operations in Australia and will enable it to continue its global expansion and further develop its suite of radiology and pathology diagnostic capabilities, the NRF says.

28.01 US President Trump has claimed Microsoft is in discussions to buy TikTok’s US operations. Trump made the claim to reporters aboard Air Force One. He signed an executive order extending the deadline for ByteDance to divest from TikTok a day after a law banning it came into effect. The outcome of the proposed deal is expected to be revealed in the coming days, Newsweek says.

28.01 Tasmanian senator Claire Chandler has been named digital economy and science shadow minister as part of a reshuffle by opposition leader Peter Dutton. Chandler takes over the role from Paul Fletcher, who is leaving politics at the forthcoming federal election. Western Sydney MP Melissa McIntosh has also been promoted to the role of shadow minister for communications, StartupDaily reports.

25.01 TechnologyOne founder Adrian Di Marco and Professor Bronwyn Fox, deputy vice chancellor of research and enterprise at the University of NSW are among those recognised in the Australia Day Honours. Two former NASA employees, Curtin University of Technology’s Leonie Rennie and the RAAF’s Brad Sheldon were also among those honoured for technology-related work, InformationAge reports.

24.01 Road Ninja, a Kiwi developed subscription online marketplace for commercial drivers, is expanding into Australia, focusing on the fly-in, fly-out driving jobs in the mining sector. The company claims to have onboarded more than 500 drivers and 100 companies in its first year in New Zealand, facilitating more than $1 million in transactions, NZ Trucking reports.

23.01 Australian tech workers are the highest paid workers in Australia, earning $20/hour more than the average employee according to Employment Hero’s SmartMatch Employment Report. Science and tech sector wages were up four percent in December, month on month, and six percent yoy, InformationAge reports.

20.01 Disaster experts are urging Australian governments to invest heavily in new technologies such as firefighting drones, water gliders, AI-powered fire detection, remote sensors, satellites and live feeds to fire fighters to fight future fires in Australia. Experts are calling for a multi-layered approach to hit fires early and stop them exploding into mega-blazes, ABC News reports.

23.01 LinkedIn is being sued for disclosing customer information to train AI models. The class action filed on behalf of millions of premium users alleges the Microsoft-owned platform disclosed private messages to third parties without permission to train models, and then attempted to ‘cover their tracks’ by quietly introducing a privacy setting  to enable or disable sharing, and updating its privacy policy, Reuters reports.

23.01 US President Donald Trump has announced a $500 billion joint venture between OpenAI, Oracle and Softbank to build a network of data centres and the infrastructure to power AI development in the US. The Guardian reports the move comes just a day after Trump reversed predecessor Joe Biden’s executive order on AI safety standards.

17.01 Canberra Commonwealth Bank of Australia customers will be able to share their Medicare credentials for identity verification in one of the first proof of concepts for the Trust Exchange (TEx). IDTechWire reports participants will be able to use the myGov app to scan a QR code and share verified information from a test Medicare card, with the bank receiving government-verified details, but not sensitive information such as Medicare numbers. TEx aims to reduce the need to share personal information and hard copy documents.

13.01 Microsoft 365 users have taken to Reddit to discuss ‘workarounds’ to avoid being automatically upgraded to more expensive Microsoft plans, featuring AI, after the vendor began hiking prices by up to 45 percent. Microsoft says existing subscribers on recurring billing can switch to plans without Copilot or AI credits, or for a limited time to M365 Personal Classic or Family Classic plans, but some users have complained that Microsoft hasn’t made it clear that automatically moving to the more expensive plans with AI features could be avoided, InformationAge reports.

06.01 Canberra-based hyperscale cloud computing provider Vault Cloud has received a $22.5 million investment from the National Reconstruction Fund. The investment is the first in the NRF’s defence capability priority area, the NRF says.

For 2024 news from around the web head over to the 2024 AppWrap archive.