From the CEO’s Desk

A big thank you to everyone who joined us for this year’s AGM, whether online or in person. The event to mark WA-IX’s 25th went off really well, with many good catch-ups and even some scrumptious cake. It was lovely to see a number of our founders in person again and hear the recognition from government, so it was a fantastic celebration of our 25 plus years of operation. The board and staff also attended strategic planning sessions, so it was a very productive time all round. Nick even managed to supervise some electrical remediation work to sort out the UPS in QV1, and even roped in our Company Secretary to clean out some old gear from there, too! Never waste a moment, or a helper.

As usual, we’ve been keeping a close eye on the regulation coming through. The legislation to modify the penalties and powers for data breaches has been introduced to parliament, with the penalties being proposed as the greater of $50 million, 3 times the benefit obtained by the conduct, or 30% of turnover. This looks to be likely to go through without real consultation or debate, given the extremes of the recent breaches we’ve seen. These penalties are definitely on the hefty side, so should certainly act as a strong deterrent, but are they sufficient incentive for good behaviour? Time will tell…

The updated Federal budget also came through this week with some cash allocated to mobile networks and NBN remediation, which is certainly good to see given the poor performing technology they have in place. Some other initiatives on digital literacy were noted and the additional training places will also be useful to our industry.

After a successful NetThing last week, we’re pulling together our last events for the year too, so if we don’t see you online at the ‘Keep Ukraine Connected’ session, I look forward to seeing you at one of the socials. Happy Networking!

Narelle