Australia Blog
News and notes from Google Down Under
Scuppering scammers: Scams Awareness Week 2019
Wednesday, August 14, 2019
Romantic scams, investment scams, shopping scams or ‘you’ve won a million dollars’ scams - more than
100,000 Australians
have reported scams this year.
That’s why we're
supporting
the ACCC’s annual
Scams Awareness Week 2019
, which runs from 12-16 August 2019.
Scams Awareness Week
aims to raise awareness and promote education on ways to detect and avoid scams and minimise impact on the community.
At Google, we’re invested in creating safer digital environments where vulnerable members of the community are less likely to fall victim to scams. We have a
dedicated help page
that identifies all of the scams purporting to be from Google.
We also make the web safer from phishing and malware with our
Safe Browsing
warnings in Chrome. Each day we find more than 7,500 unsafe sites, so when you click through to an unsafe page using your Chrome browser, we’ll display a warning and encourage you to go elsewhere. We provide this intel to the
Stop Badware
coalition to help other service providers make the web safer too.
What can you do to help keep your data safe and secure? Take this quick
Security Check-Up
to review your current Google account settings and check out the
five things you can do right now
. You can also visit the
Google Safety Centre
for more advice about staying safe online.
Google works to make our services trustworthy and robust. For example, automatic Gmail spam and phishing filters block
99.9 percent
of suspicious or dangerous emails before they reach you and we block
billions of bad ads
so you’re better protected as you browse the internet.
You’ll see a lot of activity this week raising awareness of online scams through #ScamsWeek19 - a timely reminder of how important it is to review your privacy and security settings and be scam aware!
Posted by Samantha Yorke, Government Affairs and Public Policy Senior Counsel, Google Australia
Game Changer Challenge 2019: Next-gen talent quiz Australia’s leading thinkers on the role of technology in tomorrow’s world
Wednesday, August 7, 2019
How can we better humanise technology? That’s the question 150 students and teachers from 18 schools in New South Wales tackled head on as part of the Department of Education’s annual
Game Changer Challenge
.
I was thrilled to join students and teachers at our Google Sydney headquarters for the flagship event, which kicked off the three day Challenge. It was organised in collaboration with Google for Education and is part of
Education Week 2019.
Schools represented came from as far west as Broken Hill and north to Nimbin - and those a little closer like the Sydney Children’s Hospital School.
Caption: Students from across NSW asked some of the country’s most esteemed tech leaders for their thoughts on the future of AI, robots and beyond.
The event saw teams of students applying critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity to come up with solutions to some of the big challenges of our future - and the role that technology can play in this.
Students learned how to apply ‘design sprint’ thinking - a human-centred approach to innovation - to address various problems. They went through simulations that taught them how to apply empathy and collaboration as part of the design thinking process.
Caption: The Game Changer Challenge pitted students against the nation’s leading thinkers on technology.
To help inform their thinking, students were also able to ask some great (and sometimes tricky!) questions of leading Australian futurists, academics and thinkers - including Scientia Professor Toby Walsh from the University of NSW, Dr Matt Beard from The Ethics Centre, Lloyd Godson who teaches Marine studies at Hastings Secondary College and Distinguished Professor Mary-Anne Williams from the University of Technology. We were also joined by the NSW Minister for Education, Sarah Mitchell and NSW Department of Education Secretary, Mark Scott.
The questions covered rural access to technology, education and healthcare, programming, how artificial intelligence could be used to build a sustainable future, and how technology has affected human evolution.
Caption: Students get creative! Breakout sessions focused on design sprint thinking.
More than 65 per cent of today's learners will work in jobs that don’t currently even exist[1]. We’re committed to helping kids develop the problem-solving abilities and digital skills they need to prepare them for this future, and to tackle the big challenges they’ll face. It was great to see firsthand the impact it had for the students who attended.
But perhaps Sydney Children’s Hospital School principal Lisa Shortland said it best:
“At our school, experiences for the students outside the hospital are fairly limited. As the Challenge is part of Education Week, which is a statewide initiative, it is a chance for our kids, and really important for them, to be part of something bigger.”
A big thanks to the NSW Department of Education, the teachers and students, and our panel of experts for collaborating to inspire Australia’s next generation of problem solvers. We can’t wait to see what these incredible students will do next!
Posted by Mel Silva, Managing Director, Google Australia
[1] World Economic Forum (
link
)
Solving big problems with AI - supporting Westmead Applied Research Centre to improve health outcomes
Wednesday, August 7, 2019
We believe technology can help solve some of the world’s most pressing challenges. Through the
Google.org Impact Challenge
and other initiatives we’ve continued to support Australian innovators who are using technology to make an impact.
This year, we invited past winners of the Australian
Google.org Impact Challenge
to apply for $1 million, as well as Google expertise, to support projects using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to solve a big problem.
Today, we announced that the University of Sydney’s
Westmead Applied Research Centre
has been awarded the $1 million Google.org AI Alumni prize for their project to customise a digital health program that supports individuals at high-risk of developing cardiovascular disease using AI.
We presented the award with the
Minister for Industry, Science and Technology
, Hon Karen Andrews MP at Westmead Hospital today and heard from the team leading this project.
The Westmead Applied Research Centre, led by Professor Clara Chow (formerly of The George Institute for Global Health), will develop a
digital health program
to deliver tailored advice to participants, harnessing AI to reduce the risk of a heart attack and giving those at risk access to high-quality prevention programs.
This will help improve engagement, behavioural change and health outcomes - ultimately reducing future cardiac events and hospitalisations.
Above: Dr Harry Klimis, Cardiologist and PhD student WARC; Marija Ralic, Google.org Manager for Asia Pacific; Mel Silva, Managing Director, Google Australia; and Professor Clara Chow, Cardiologist and Academic Director WARC
We believe that AI can provide new ways of approaching problems and can help to improve people’s lives. AI provides another tool to explore and address hard questions and this program builds on our existing
AI for Social Good
initiative, which focuses Google’s AI expertise on solving humanitarian and environmental challenges.
Huge congratulations again to the University of Sydney’s
Westmead Applied Research Centre
team!
Posted by Mel Silva, Managing Director, Google Australia
Helping Australian consumers, businesses and publishers
Sunday, July 28, 2019
When Google started just over 20 years ago, Sydney was gearing up for the Olympics and text messaging was taking off. Today, Australians come to Google for helpful products and services, whether it’s finding answers to questions, getting directions through maps, or businesses connecting with new audiences through advertising.
In this fast evolving environment, we understand the interest in how we operate and how we compete. The final report from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s
Digital Platforms Inquiry
recognises a range of benefits digital platforms bring to consumers and businesses, and examines important topics in relation to Australia’s changing media and advertising industry. We’re looking forward to engaging with the Government as they consult on these topics in the coming weeks and months.
Set out below is more detail on how Google provides value for consumers, businesses and publishers, how we work to protect user privacy, and how we operate in a highly competitive environment.
Providing value for consumers, businesses and publishers
Our products and services help Australians to access information, collaborate, reach new audiences and get things done.
Tools like Google Search and YouTube help Australian students answer more than 25 million questions while doing their homework each night and Google Maps helps Australians save, on average, 29 hours per year navigating our cities (
Alphabeta
).
Google’s products also help Australian businesses grow; more than 840,000 Australian businesses use Google tools to help connect with customers. The majority of Google’s ad business is search advertising. Google works to offer the best experience for users when they come to search, which attracts people to use the service. In turn, advertisers can more easily find prospective customers by advertising on Google’s Search pages.
In this way, advertisers can reach the audiences that matter to them, at a time that is relevant to the consumer. For example, if someone searches for a new car, a car ad is often relevant. These services are provided without charge to consumers.
Google’s advertising platforms also help publishers make money online and drive traffic to their websites. In 2018, Google referred more than 2 billion free clicks to Australian news sites, which helps to drive subscriptions and ad revenue. We also provide a platform to help publishers to show ads on their own sites. This is used by thousands of news publishers both in Australia and around the world, and publishers retain approximately 70 per cent of the ad revenue that is generated.
Through this combination of referral traffic and ad revenue, Google provides significant value to publishers. Ad-supported models have always been part of the news industry, whether print or digital, and we share their interest in keeping the internet free and open. We work closely with the news industry and will continue to do so as consumer expectations and technology evolve.
How we work to protect user privacy
Over the past 20 years, billions of people have come to Google with their questions. We’ve worked hard to continually earn trust by providing accurate answers and keeping your questions private and your data secure.
For privacy to be real, people need to have clear, individual choices around their data. This is why we believe in giving people transparency, choice and control. Transparency means easy access and full visibility of your data and preferences, and the assurance that Google does not sell personal information to third parties. Choice means the user should get to decide how their information is used and deleted. Control is the ability to manage your settings and features depending on your preferences.
Google’s
privacy policy
and
MyAccount
—a single destination for your Google account information, privacy and security settings—explain what information we collect, why we collect it, and how users can control, update, manage, export, and delete their information. In 2017, Australians visited
MyAccount
more than 22 million times.
Whether it’s delivering search results in the correct language or recommending the quickest route home, data can make Google products more helpful to you. We take the responsibility of protecting user data and privacy seriously, and are
continuously working to improve features to give users even more control
.
Operating in a highly competitive environment
The tech industry is dynamic and drives innovation that gives consumers better products, services and choices. For example, when consumers are looking for information online, they go to a range of places in addition to Google. For furniture and electrical products they might go to Harvey Norman. For homes, they might go to Domain or Realestate.com. For reviews they might go to TripAdvisor.
When it comes to advertising, search advertising is one of many online and offline channels in which advertisers invest. We compete directly for advertising dollars with other digital channels, as well as television, print, radio and outdoor advertising. Businesses invest in online advertising because it allows them to connect with audiences and to measure the impact of that investment.
The internet is a rapidly evolving, competitive and innovative space. Regulatory frameworks help ensure people, society and the economy continue to benefit from new technologies. A wide range of rules already apply to digital products and services, including competition, advertising, copyright, privacy, and consumer laws.
We welcome efforts to better understand our business and will continue to engage with Government on the recommendations put forward in this report, as we continue developing and improving products and services that help Australians.
Posted by Melanie Silva, Managing Director, Google Australia
Grow with Google digital skills training to go Australia-wide in 2020
Friday, July 19, 2019
Google’s free digital skills training program
Grow With Google
will visit all states and territories in 2020, making training available for people right across Australia.
Grow with Google
aims to give all Australians access to digital skills training, both online and in-person, to help them make the most of the Web.
I shared this news in front of 200 small businesses, community organisations and individuals today at a Grow with Google event at the Cronulla Sharks Leagues Club.
Caption: More than 200 small businesses, community organisations and individuals joined the Grow with Google Sutherland Shire event.
At today’s event, local Sutherland Shire businesses learned how to grow their presence online and find new customers, and individuals at all stages of the digital journey picked up new skills and tips.
Caption: Google Australia Country Director Mel Silva with Kirsty Tilla, owner of Cronulla business
LOAF Sandwiches
.
It was great to bring these workshops to the Sutherland Shire to help more people get the digital skills they need to grow and thrive.
We are thrilled to be taking Grow with Google national in 2020, visiting metropolitan and regional centres across Australia so that everyone has the opportunity to participate.
Since 2014, Google has trained more than half a million people across Australia through online and in-person digital skills training, as well as curriculum integrated through school and partner programs.
Grow with Google
aims to create opportunity for all Australians to grow their skills, careers, and businesses with free tools, training, and events. The next Grow with Google event will be held
in Canberra
on 11 September. Find out more at:
g.co/GrowAustralia
Posted by Mel Silva, Country Director, Google Australia
Announcing the 2019 PhD Fellowships to support leading computer science research in Australia
Monday, July 8, 2019
The
Google PhD Fellowship program
supports PhD students in computer science and related fields, building strong relationships with the global academic community. In the most recent round, four PhD students in Australia have been recognised for their outstanding efforts.
Hua Hua, Google Phd Fellowship in Human-Computer Interaction (ANU)
Research Proposal: Learning and Reasoning about Human Place Knowledge
Hua's research aims to make human place knowledge understandable and usable by computers. As a member of the Artificial Intelligence Research Group at ANU, he focuses on solving this problem by combining qualitative representation and reasoning with machine learning (ML) techniques.
Xuanyi Dong, Google PhD Fellowship in Machine Perception (UTS)
Research Proposal: Automated ML with Imperfect Data for Machine Perception
Xuanyi focuses on solving real-world computer vision problems with deep learning techniques. He has been fascinated by automated ML model design and optimization, making machines better understand images and videos and making AI accessible to everyone.
Zhanna Sarsenbayeva, Google PhD Fellowship in Human-Computer Interaction (University of Melbourne)
Research Proposal: Quantifying the Effects of Situational Impairments on Mobile Interaction
Zhanna's interest about technology and its impact on people let her pursue a career in Human-Computer Interaction. Her research is focused on a systematic understanding of the effects of different situational impairments on mobile interaction when designing accessible technology as it can benefit users of all abilities.
Zhi Tian, Google PhD Fellowship in Machine Perception (University of Adelaide)
Research Proposal: Fully Convolutional One-Stage Instance-level Recognition
Zhi Tian was awarded the Google PhD Fellowship for his work in high-performance dense per-pixel prediction for scene understanding with deep neural networks. His research looks at developing simple yet accurate deep learning techniques for fundamental computer vision tasks such as semantic pixel labelling, object detection, instance-level segmentation in images.
In supporting these Fellows we recognise their significant academic achievements and contribution. We look forward to building even stronger links to support important research in Australia.
Posted by Marie Efstathiou, University Relations and Computer Science Education, Google Australia
Get in the game: Vote for your favourite AFL players with Search
Friday, June 28, 2019
We know that sport holds a special place in Aussies’ hearts – so we’re always looking for ways to help you get closer to the action. Last year,
we made updates
to Search and the Google Assistant to give you live scores, match results, upcoming fixtures and ladders for AFL, NRL, Rugby, Cricket and more.
The 2019 AFL season has already brought many moments to remember – like
Liam Ryan's stunning mark
and
Eddie Betts delivering magic in the pocket.
And with a cracking season underway, we’ve partnered with the Australian Football League to help bring you a new way to get into the game. Starting today, you’ll be able to vote for your favourite AFL players right on Google Search.
To have your say, just search for “AFL vote”. You can vote once per day when you’re signed into your Google Account. There will be one winner for each category, and the results will be shared on
AFL.com.au
soon after voting closes.
So you can mark your calendar, here are the categories and timeframes for voting:
Best on Ground:
Voting will be open for every Friday night match from 8:30pm to 10:45pm AEST from Round 15 for the rest of the home and away season and in the Finals.
Player of the Round:
You can vote the best player from the weekend from 3pm Monday to 3pm AEST Wednesday during the home and away season, from Round 15 onwards.
Fan Awards
: Launching at the end of the home and away season. Stay tuned for more exciting categories!
Once you’ve voted, you can also keep up to date with the latest scores, news and the ladder. Just head to Google and type in “AFL” so you don’t miss any hangers, bumps and goals from the weekend.
Whether you’re cheering for Nat Fyfe, Tim Kelly, Luke Parker or one of my favourite Saints, like Jack Billings, be sure to cast your vote and have your say.
Happy Voting!
Posted by Aisling Finch, Director of Marketing, Google Australia and New Zealand
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