From the ACMA: Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) Chairman Chris Chapman has delivered a speech outlining the current work and priorities of the ACMA at the Communications Day Summit.
Among the ACMA initiatives and priorities highlighted were the following:
- A spectrum plan which portended a $30 smart phone handset and potential economic benefits to Australian consumers and the country’s GDP of hundreds of millions of dollars.
- ‘First principles’ review to establish what content benchmarks media audiences are looking to safeguard as delivery platforms change.
- The release of a paper, Regulatory strategies for a network economy and society, to better respond to emerging areas of concern around digital content, identity and reputation.
- Research to inform responses to protecting personal data, mobile app issues such as consent, personal and financial risk and privacy, the deployment of cloud computing and new wireless technologies, such as Near Field Communications.
- Modelling to forecast the economic mobile technology impacts of various spectrum supply scenarios.
Mr Chapman also focussed on the ACMA’s renewed telco consumer protection efforts, reporting a 20% drop in complaints. He added that the industry had stopped using confusing terms, such as capped and free, and had added standard charging information to mobile and internet plans. And according to Mr Chapman, the majority of large and medium operators had rolled out new easy-to-understand Critical Information Summaries.
You can read more about the speech here and find a full copy of the speech here.