30 Adoption of a robust information privacy scheme by Australian businesses would make it easier to convince overseas authorities that personal information will be protected in Australia. The Australian common law recognises no general right to privacy. Defamation law and actions for breach of a duty of confidence can apply in a limited range of circumstances, but litigation is slow and expensive and not a realistic option for most people affected by privacy intrusions. But the coverage is patchy and many of the laws focus on the security of personal information, which is only one part of the information privacy package. There are already many industry codes of practice in Australia, some containing an information privacy element.
None deals with the full range of information privacy issues.
This is not to say that the information privacy parts of existing codes are not useful or that they should be abandoned in favour of specialised privacy codes, but it does suggest that more consistent protection could be achieved if benchmark standards were accepted in all sectors. These standards could then be picked up in existing sectoral codes or guidelines. Other sectors where information privacy is clearly an issue operate without agreed guidelines, for example, mercantile agents and private investigators have rules of thumb for acceptable practice but these are nowhere written down. This does not mean that these sectors are privacy black spots, but it suggests that a more proactive approach is needed to satisfy concerns and provide remedies for abuses. The need for a new initiative 34 There is a general domestic and international consensus that information privacy concerns must be addressed urgently as part of a framework to facilitate the growth of the new information economy and to ensure consumer confidence in electronic commerce and electronic service delivery.