Sandra Rossi

The Australian telecoms market will grow a paltry 2.8 percent in the 2008 financial year to A$36.3 billion (US$30 billion) driven largely by broadband and data services.

A Gartner analyst predicts that technology departments as we know them will no longer exist in five years, splitting in half to focus on different priorities. Get ready for a whole new org chart

Repeated attempts by the Australian government to get the Access Card legislation through parliament has stalled, with future plans for the smartcard now on hold until at least 2008. Human Services Minister Chris Ellison has admitted the government's original timetable, which involved getting the legislation through both houses of parliament by June 2007, was far too ambitious.

The Northern Territory is the focus of a new e-mail causing havoc throughout Australia. According to Sophos, Australian organizations need to be aware of malicious spam circulating in Australia which pretends to be from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Telecom managers will need to get a handle on which technologies are likely to emerge in the telecommunications industry over the next five years because users are going mobile with or without IT support.

The data warehouse firm says its 5500 server will not only be 75 per cent cooler, it will also offer coexistence with multiple generations of hardware, protecting previous investments

A plan to tackle privacy and security issues that continue to hamper the launch of the Australian Government's A$1.1 billion Access Card was released by the Biometrics Institute recently. The plan follows continuing parliamentary debate which has stalled the Access Card legislation with members of the Senate seeking additional privacy safeguards.

When it comes to privacy, Australians are left to choose between garbage, trash or junk, says Gartner's vice-president of research, Rich Mogull. There is no legislative protection in Australia and no market forces pushing organizations to do better, he explains. Mogull believes legislation should include strict penalties and a built-in mechanism that allows consumers to take legal action themselves.