Re: "people already hand over masses of info to private firms"...
> I rather fear that the reality is that you have handed over more data than you think. I wouldn't be
> surprised if even the more privacy-conscious among us have had data taken by stealth.
> So many things we do - using a mobile phone, using a credit or debit card, etc. are
> practically unavoidable in this day and age, and all are opportunities for someone
> somewhere to scrape a bit of data about us
Quite possibly but the key point to remember about this is that data taken in this way is taken by force. It was not voluntary.
And so, even though what you say here may be true, it still doesn't justify the government taking yet more data by force.
Rudd's claimed justification that we already choose to give data to businesses is still false, in that many people do not choose to do that, and still does not justify the government taking more by force.