Information Privacy, Data Surveillance and Security--How Aus-tralian Privacy Law Fully Plays Its Role in the Age of Big Data

Abstract

Privacy and the protection of privacy is a common topic studied by many scholars. From the very beginning of human culture, people have personal privacy, which is not willing for them to be unveiled by others. With the development of information technology, especially the internet, knowledge and information are dealt by internet users in conscious or unconscious way, and personal information has been rapidly and quickly distributed and disseminated all over the world. Personal data can be collected by hackers or interlinks from the website, internet not only provides people an era with internet links, but also an age with information collections, a big data age. With the background of big data, this essay tries to put forward the correlative relationship between the protection of information privacy and the privacy law in Australia. It first has an overview of the concepts of information privacy and data surveillance under the background of big data, then highlights the importance of data security in the age of big data; with a literature review on the development of Australian privacy acts, it further claims that privacy acts or regulations by the federal or states provided strong support for the protection of personal data. Then relationship between the protection information privacy and the need of judicial guarantee is further studied for thorough methods or regimes in data protection. With these points studied, this essay aims to highlight the importance of data protection and information privacy. On the other hand, it aims to provide awareness for readers the vital role privacy laws can play in the protection of people’s personal information and emphases the importance of a continuous evolution for privacy law system in the age of big data.