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James Cook claims Australia for the British
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British govt names Botany Bay as the location for a new penal colony.
(Christopher & Maxwell-Stewart 2013, p68) -
Australia's colonisation begins
The Supply, with 10 other ships carrying 1480 prisoners, reaches Botany Bay (Christopher & Maxwell-Stewart 2013, p68) and Britain's colonisation of the Australian continent begins. -
Australia's colonist population reaches 1.5 million.
By this year, 800 more ships carrying 160,000 convicts and other migrants arrive in Australia. (Christopher & Maxwell-Stewart 2013, p68). -
Queensland Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act of 1897 is passed
Subsequently becomes a model for legislation established in all extant Australian states for the control and surveillance of Indigenous peoples by colonial governments. Under these acts, "all people who were deemed Aboriginal" could be "moved to a reserve and kept there against their will with no right of appeal", being denied rights to vote and their ability to "fraternise" with non-Indigenous people (Broome 2019, p118-119). -
Period: to
Exemption Certificates introduced for Indigenous peoples to grant them freedom from the provisions of protection acts
"Required severing all ties with their Aboriginal kinship and culture... or the exemption could be revoked" (Wickes 2008, p77). Those exempt were subject to intense surveillance, with certificates having to be carried at all times so people could prove their status at any time, and those exempt having to engage in a "process of ongoing self-regulation, which involved sobriety, thrift, cleanliness, regular employment and disassociating from Aboriginal kin, culture and country" (Wickes 2008, p84). -
Suspect Targeting Management Plan (STMP) is introduced in New South Wales
Intended to "identify individuals at-risk of recidivism" (Mann & Daly 2019, p385). Found to have "facilitated surveillance of Indigenous youths" (Mann & Daly 2019, p385), with children below the minimum age of criminal responsibility being tracked under the program's provisions. STMP targets were "identified by intelligence officers using an internal IT system" (Rose 2023), being called "state-inflicted data injustice" (Mann & Daly 2019, p385) against Indigenous youth as a result. -
Northern Territory Intervention, including computer surveillance, begins
Intended "to curtail child abuse and other forms of violence in remote Indigenous communities" (Mann & Daly 2019, p384). Included the monitoring of internet use on public computers in Indigenous communities (with computers in majority non-Indigenous computers not subject to this surveillance), intended to ensure that pornography was not being accessed. This measure has been extensively criticised as constituting the "institutional surveillance of a marginalised group" (Rennie et al. 2017, p4). -
Cashless Welfare Card (BasicsCard) introduced, criticised as 'welfare surveillance'
Did "not allow cash withdrawals, and [could not] be used to purchase alcohol or gambling products" in an effort to "encourage socially responsible behaviour" (Smith 2017, p22). Criticised as "welfare surveillance" aiming to "regulate the behaviours and actions of Aboriginal peoples" (Mann & Daly 2019, p384), with Indigenous recipients of the BasicsCard making up "49 and 45 per cent of the total Indigenous populations in the East Kimberley and Ceduna regions, respectively" (Smith 2017, p22). -
Consorting laws used to surveil Indigenous people through social media
Consorting laws, intended to counteract associations between organised criminals, revealed to be used to track Indigenous people through social media use - 44% of those undergoing surveillance under this legislation being Indigenous (Kennedy & Frazer 2021, p4). Included the examination of Indigenous people's Facebook profiles, with police "using social media to track who Indigenous people were associating with, determining if they were breaching bail conditions" (Kennedy & Frazer 2021, p4). -
'Digital Inclusion' Closing the Gap target introduced
A new Closing the Gap target is added, with the aim that "by 2026, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have equal levels of digital inclusion" (Closing the Gap 2021). -
Yoorrook Justice Commission adopts Indigenous Data Sovereignty priniciples
Indigenous Data Sovereignty techniques are already being employed in some relevant contexts: for instance, the Victorian Yoorrook truth telling commission describes itself as the first inquiry of its kind to employ Indigenous Data Sovereignty in its data collection strategies (Yoorrook Justice Commission 2022). -
STMP scrapped for discrimination
The STMP is scrapped after the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission finds that the program has had discriminatory consequences, with the involvement of digital programs in target selection specifically criticised as contributing to the "gross overrepresentation of young Aboriginal STMP targets" (Rose 2023). -
Digital Gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous at 7.5 score points
The Digital Inclusion Index (2023) releases its latest digital inclusion snapshot, including data on Indigenous digital vulnerability. The Index found that there is a digital gap of 7.5 score points between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, increasing to 25.3 score points in remote communities. The access gap in these remote communities is 37 score points, with an affordability gap of 14 and ability gap of 19. -
Voice Referendum fails, misinformation involved
Researcher Timothy Graham's (2024) analysis of discourses around the referendum on social media suggests that misinformation played a role in its defeat and the further marginalisation of Indigenous peoples. Graham (2024, p20) argues that misinformation on social media during the referendum "cultivated an atmosphere of scepticism and inquiry, leveraging the conditions of a ‘regime of post-truth’ ... marked by diminishing trust in scientific expertise and governmental authority". -
Period: to
Possible future: Indigenous Data Sovereignty
An ideal future in which data practices in Australia are decolonised through Indigenous Data Sovereignty initiatives. These initiatives involve the "right of Indigenous nations and peoples to govern the collection, ownership and use of data" (Mann & Daly 2019, p13), and the recognition of Indigenous peoples' "inherent and inalienable rights and interests … relating to the collection, ownership and application of data about their people, lifeways and territories" (Kukutai & Taylor 2016, p2).