### Issue 1721 - Wednesday 26th October, 2022

## In Today's Issue

- 2022 Federal Budget has stuff all tech stuff in it
- Medibank admit all their customer data was stolen & doesn't have cyber-attack insurance
- iOS developers upset at the huge amount of gambling & casino ads on their App Store listings
- Spotify gave up selling audiobooks on iOS because App Store customer contact rules are a mess
- Cheap 12TB Seagate HDD, Bose Soundbar 700, iPhone 13 mini, Ryzen 5700X, Boost $300 SIM, Mac Studio, Razer Kishi Android game controller

## The News

### 2022 Federal Budget has stuff all tech stuff in it

The new federal government's first budget took place last night and it's not very interesting from a tech perspective. The bulk of the tech related announcements add up to around $500m for "IT modernisation" for various government departments and TAFEs across the country. An additional $5.5m is set for the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) to handle investigating the Optus data breach. They might need an extra funding boost for the Medicare breach! The Treasurer cut $3.9m by ending the previous government's "Supporting Women’s Mid-Career Transition into the Tech Workforce" program a year early, but slapped in $5.8m for "women in STEM programs". NBN is getting $2.4b to replace more FTTN with FTTP. The lucky areas to get the upgrades will be announced "in the coming months".

### Medibank admit all their customer data was stolen & doesn't have cyber-attack insurance

Medibank has told the ASX that all AHM, international student and Medibank customers "personal data and significant amounts of health claims data" were accessed by a "criminal" and "expect that the number of affected customers could grow substantially". Medibank still doesn't know which customers, but I think at this point its safe to assume that all 3.9 million Medibank customers will have their sensitive medial data blowing around the dark web soon. Medibank also said they do not have cyber-attack insurance, so will be on the hook for $25m to $35m of costs to replace compromised ID and offer identity monitoring services for impacted customers. Last week the hacker was threatening to blackmail "1k most media persons from your database" - not sure what's going on with that. Meanwhile, the federal government has "activated the national coordination mechanism", normally used for stuff like pandemics or natural disasters.

### iOS developers upset at the huge amount of gambling & casino ads on their App Store listings

Apple has kicked off a new range of ad spots worldwide (except China) on the App Store, including a controversial placement in the "You Might Also Like" section at the bottom of individual app listings. It's bad enough the cashed up competitors can no buy ad inventory directly on a competitor's App Store listing, but developers are cracking the shits that there's ads for bookies and online casinos underneath their App Store listing. A more conspiratorially minded person might think this is Apple slicing the salami for "personalised" (i.e: Facebook/Google style data driven) advertising. Don't wanna see these ads? Just opt-in to Apple tracking you to get more relevant ads. You can trust us, we care about your privacy! Remember when we put up billboards and ran TV ads to tell you?! I'm sure it doesn't hurt that Apple gets paid for the ads and gets a 15%/30% cut of all revenue those casino apps make via in-app purchases.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### Spotify gave up selling audiobooks on iOS because App Store customer contact rules are a mess

Also in shit things Apple does - Spotify wanted to sell audiobooks in its iOS app, but didn't want to give Apple a 30% cut of every sale as that would make it unprofitable. Their team of lawyers came up with a convoluted customer process that sent an email with a link to the audiobook on Spotify's website when that customer tapped a padlock icon for the audiobook in Spotify's iOS app. Apple approved that, but then changed it mind on the next app update. Spotify then changed that email to simply have link to Spotify's audiobook range, suggesting you can use Spotify's website to buy the audiobook, cutting out the direct link to the actual audiobook. No good said Apple, so Spotify replaced that email with a generic email stating you can buy audiobooks on Spotify's website, no link at all. Apple doesn't like that either, so Spotify just gave up selling audiobooks on iOS, conveniently excluding what could be a strong competitor for Apple and Amazon/Audible.

## Bargains

- Seagate EXOS 12TB Enterprise SATA Hard Disk - $297 from 2020ling's eBay store
- Bose Soundbar 700 (Black) - $597 from JB Hi-Fi
- iPhone 13 Mini 512GB - $1339 from PCByte
- AMD Ryzen 7 5700X CPU - $339 from Amazon
- Boost $300 Prepaid SIM Starter Kit (260GB, Activate By 26/11) - $249.90 from Oztechbiz
- Apple Mac Studio M1 Max 512GB - $2789 from JB Hi-Fi
- Razer Kishi Controller for Android - $72.21 from Amazon

## Image Of The Day

Sign advertising Telecom computer links - Stones Corner - 8 September 1987 (National Archives of Australia)

## The End

📻 This Heat - Deeper

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The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.