Helen Bird, Swinburne University of Technology

Asked today whether Optus’s chief executive should be considering his future after the “completely unacceptable” Triple Zero outage, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told the ABC “I would be surprised if that wasn’t occurring.” Communications Minister Anika Wells has also vowed “Optus will be held to account”.

What does holding Optus “to account” mean, when we still have no clear picture of who’s responsible within the company for stopping things going wrong? Given another chief executive was already appointed since Optus’s 2023 network outage, what difference would yet another replacement make?

Rather than focus on one person, the real question is what can be done to fix the systems beneath them – especially when it comes to delivering faster, more transparent disclosure when things go wrong.

History repeating at Optus

Optus’s 2023 and 2025 failures are strikingly similar. Both were technology-related. Both occurred during routine maintenance or updates. Both resulted in system-wide outages. And in both cases, Optus was far too slow to let the public and responsible authorities know about the outages.

Last Friday, Optus belatedly revealed 600 customers were unable to call 000 for emergency help for half a day – then it was more than a day before Optus publicly revealed it had even happened. It affected people in four states and territories, with at least three deaths during the outage now being investigated.

Emergency call failures create serious regulatory, legal, reputation and customer risks for Optus. However, when it comes to understanding how Optus manages those risks, we’re confronted with a black hole.

Immediately after the November 2023 outage, I wrote about the lack of transparency about how Optus is run. As a private company, it has no legal obligation to publicly disclose its risk management and governance arrangements.

When the then Optus chief executive Kelly Bayer Rosmarin resigned five days later, on November 20 2023, I wrote this was no guarantee of change – because the real decisions at Optus were made by its parent company, Singtel, based in Singapore.

Optus never revealed what its 2023 inquiry found

Optus never published the results of its own investigations of its November 2023 Triple Zero outage.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) later fined Optus A$12 million for breaching national Emergency Call Rules.

Today, ACMA said it had started an investigation into last week’s outage. Its findings will be made public.

In May 2024, Optus announced the appointment of industry heavyweight Stephen Rue as its new chief executive, under what it called a “new governance model” (although how it differed from the previous model wasn’t made fully clear).

The Optus website shows it now has a board of seven directors, with a majority of non-executive directors. Previously, the board was made of executives with a non-executive chair. In theory, that change should have improved governance at Optus.

It’s not clear who is currently in charge of risk management at Optus. In June, Optus announced the appointment of a new chief security and risk officer, Pieter van der Merwe, starting later this year.

In contrast with Singtel, there is no easily available map of Optus’s organisational structure, explanation of its approach to risk management or the role that its board has in risk oversight.

After the 2023 breach, the regulator ACMA updated the national Emergency Call Service Rules for all telecommunication companies, also including Telstra and TPG. These included four new risk requirements for:

• better communication with customers and other stakeholders during an outage
• greater oversight of the 000 ecosystem
• regular systems testing
• and ensuring emergency calls can be carried by other telecommunication companies when needed.

The early signs suggest Optus did not meet these requirements, though we should wait the outcome of ACMA’s newly announced investigation to be definitive.

Optus vs Telstra on 000 failures

Telstra also had a 000 outage in March 2004. How did it fare by comparison?

Like Optus, Telstra was found to be breach of the emergency call rules, and was fined $3 million by ACMA.

However, there were three key differences:

• Telstra had a strong record of compliance with the emergency call rules, unlike Optus.
• Telstra made considerable efforts to keep the public informed during the outage, no doubt reinforced by its legal obligations to make disclosures as a public company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange.
• Telstra also took immediate actions by notifying emergency services of caller details affected by the disruption.

5 steps that would do more than sacking the boss

What does Optus need to do to avoid a third Triple Zero outage?

Five governance improvements would help – especially to deliver improved, more transparent disclosure.

1. Unlike last time, Optus should publish the full report resulting from its own inquiries into this incident. This should include a list of recommendations and a timeline to action them.
2. Optus should explain how it follows ACMA’s emergency service rules, including how it will manage future outages.
3. Optus should carry out a root-and-branch review of its risk management generally and emergency call risks in particular.
4. Optus should adopt and follow the ASX Corporate Governance Principles and Recommendations that apply to public companies, including Telstra.
5. Optus needs to explain more clearly on its website how risk management is monitored by its executives and board here in Australia – not by Singtel in Singapore.

If these issues are not addressed, it may be time for the communications minister to add governance conditions on Optus’s carrier licence – which she already has the power to do.

It may be tempting to call for the chief executive to be sacked. However, doing that would let Optus looks like it’s acting, while delaying real action.

It would be better to keep the current chief executive and do what the federal government has pledged: hold Optus to account.

Helen Bird, Industry Fellow, Corporate Governance & Senior Lecturer, Swinburne Law School, Swinburne University of Technology

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Wellett Potter, University of New England

This week Disney, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros Discovery jointly sued MiniMax, a Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) company, over alleged copyright infringement.

The three Hollywood media giants allege MiniMax (which operates Hailuo AI and is reportedly valued at US$4 billion) engaged in mass copyright infringement of characters such as Darth Vader and Mickey Mouse by scraping vast amounts of copyrighted data to train their models without permission or payment.

This lawsuit is the latest in a growing list of copyright infringement cases involving AI. These cases include authors, publishers, newspapers, music labels and independent musicians around the world.

Disney, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros Discovery have the resources to litigate hard and possibly shape future precedent. They are seeking damages and an injunction against the ongoing use of their material.

Cases like this one suggest the common approach of “scraping first” and dealing with consequences later may be unsustainable. Other methods for ethically, morally and legally obtaining data are urgently needed.

One method some people are starting to explore is licensed use. So what exactly does that mean – and is it really a solution to the growing copyright problems AI presents?

What is licensing?

Licensing is a legal mechanism which allows the use of creative works under agreed terms, often for a fee. It usually involves two key players: the copyright owner (for example, a movie studio) and the user of the creative work (for example, an AI company).

Generally, a non-exclusive licence is where, in return for a fee, the copyright owner gives the user permission to exercise certain rights but retains ownership of the work.

In the context of generative AI use, granting a non-exclusive license could result in AI companies gaining permission for use and paying a fee. They could use the copyright owner’s material for training purposes, rather than simply scraping without consent.

There are several licensing models, which are already being used in some AI contexts. These include voluntary, collective and statutory licensing models.

What are these models?

Voluntary licensing happens when a copyright owner directly permits an AI company to use their work, usually for a payment. It can work for large, high-value deals. For example, the Associated Press licensed their archive to OpenAI, the owner of ChatGPT.

However, when there are thousands of copyright owners involved who each own a smaller number of works, this method is slow, cumbersome and expensive.

Another problem is that once a generative AI company has made one copy of a work under license, it is uncertain whether this copy may be used for other tasks. Also, applying voluntary licensing to AI training is hard to scale, because training requires vast datasets.

This makes individual agreements with each copyright owner impractical. It can be complex in terms of determining who owns the rights, what should be cleared and how much to pay. The licensing fee may also be prohibitive to smaller AI firms, and individual copyright owners may not receive much revenue for the use.

Collective licensing allows copyright owners to have their rights managed by an organisation known as a collecting society. The society negotiates with the user and distributes licensing fees to the copyright owners.

This model is already commonly used in the publishing and music industries. In theory, if it is expanded to the AI industry, it could provide AI companies with access to large catalogues of data more efficiently.

There are already some examples. In April 2025, a collective license for generative AI use was announced in the United Kingdom. Earlier this month, another was announced in Sweden.

However, this model raises questions about fee structures, and the actual use itself. How would fees be calculated? How much would be paid? What constitutes “use” in AI training? It is uncertain whether copyright owners with smaller catalogues would benefit as much as big players.

A statutory (or compulsory) licensing scheme is another option. It already exists in other contexts in Australia such as education and government use. Under such a model, the government could permit AI firms to use works for training without requiring permission from each copyright owner.

A fee would be paid into a central scheme at a predetermined rate. This approach would ensure AI companies access training data while ensuring some remuneration to copyright owners. However, it removes copyright owners’ ability to say no to the use.

A risk of domination

In practice, these licensing models sit on a spectrum with variations. Together, they represent some future ways the rights of creators may be reconciled with AI companies’ hunger for data.

Different forms of licensing offer potential opportunities for copyright owners and AI companies. It is by no means a silver bullet.

Voluntary agreements can be slow, fragmented and not result in much revenue for copyright owners. Collective schemes raise questions about fairness and transparency. Statutory models risk under-valuing creative work and rendering copyright owners powerless over the use of their work.

These challenges highlight a much bigger issue which is raised when copyright is considered in new technological contexts. That is, how to strike a balance between those involved, while still promoting fairness and innovation.

If a careful balance is not struck, there is a risk of domination from a handful of powerful AI companies and media giants.

Wellett Potter, Lecturer in Law, University of New England

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Rod Sims, The University of Melbourne

Australia’s new emission reduction target of 62–70% by 2035 is meant to demonstrate we are doing our part to hold climate change well below 2°C.

The new target can just about do this if we hit the upper end of the range.

To get there, Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen today outlined new funding to help industry go clean and boost clean energy financing and clean fuels.

On top of our existing policies, these don’t look to be enough to trigger the step change needed. But there is a deeper problem. At present, the government’s approach is one of command and control. Canberra is deciding what goes ahead and what doesn’t. This approach is not only inefficient but has a very real limit – how far the public purse will stretch.

Far and away the best option to rapidly cut emissions is to once again price carbon. When it costs money to emit carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, markets start shifting huge amounts of money into clean alternatives. The funds raised can help strengthen the budget – and compensate consumers, who are currently not being compensated for current policy costs.

The question now is whether the government can shake off their memory of the political turmoil around the introduction of the last carbon price introduced in 2012 – especially given this turmoil had much to do with constant leadership changes.

Is this range the “sweet spot”?

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the long-anticipated 2035 target range as a “sweet spot”, while Minister Bowen said anything more ambitious than 70% was not achievable.

While this focus on achievability is commendable, it’s also unfortunately true that Australia’s remaining carbon budget is shrinking rapidly.

Globally, this budget represents the emissions that can still be emitted with a good chance of keeping warming under 2°C. Australia’s share is about 10 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent between 2013 and 2050, when we have pledged to hit net zero.

At present, our emissions are about 440 million tonnes a year, which would mean using up our budget by 2036 – well short of 2050. So we must accelerate emission reduction.

Some experts argue a lower target than just announced is appropriate, given policies aren’t in place to achieve more. But this is self-defeating – the focus must be on having the appropriate policies.

Reaching this target requires better policies

Australia’s current suite of policies are leading to slow declines in emissions.

Unfortunately, the government’s new and existing policies don’t seem up to the task of meeting the 43% by 2030 target, let alone the new 62–70% cuts five years later.

To date, the government has heavily relied on two policies to bring emissions down. Both have flaws.

The first is the Capacity Investment Scheme, which underwrites renewable energy generation and storage projects. In the absence of a carbon price, the government needs to underwrite projects as there is no green premium to create incentives for market-led investment. The government, not the market, is deciding which clean energy projects proceed.

Underwriting new projects comes with a large contingent liability, as the Commonwealth budget is partly underwriting these projects. The scheme is proceeding more slowly than the government hoped.

The second is the Safeguard Mechanism, which requires major industrial emitters to progressively lower their emissions. The scheme covers less than 30% of the economy and applies to emissions intensity rather than overall emissions, meaning higher production can lead to higher emissions.

Today, the government announced A$5 billion to support large industrial facilities to make major investments in decarbonisation and energy efficiency, $1 billion for a clean fuel fund, $2 billion to accelerate renewable project rollout and additional funding for household decarbonisation and kerbside EV charging. As it stands, these don’t seem sufficient.

Outside the land use sector, Australia’s emissions have remained broadly flat since 2005. They haven’t risen sharply, but they have not declined. If the government restricts itself to small adjustments to existing policies, this is unlikely to change.

Time to look at a carbon price

It would be far simpler to reintroduce a carbon price.

For two years from June 2012, Australia had a carbon price. It worked. Markets funded lower-emission power sources over higher-emission ones. But the scheme became politically fraught and was repealed. Since then, pricing carbon has been seen as politically unviable.

This paralysis is unfortunate. We need to judge what is politically possible today, not what happened a decade ago. Notably, in 2021, the Morrison Coalition government released modelling showing a carbon price would be necessary to reach net zero.

With a carbon price off the table, the government is left with expensive and slow policies. Worse, it faces significant political risks if it fails to meet its own targets while increasing costs to consumers – without the revenue a carbon price could provide as compensation.

Much of the debate over carbon pricing is between supporters of climate action and those who oppose any action to reduce emissions. Those wanting climate action have been forced to fight on weaker ground defending inefficient measures. It’s counterproductive not to use the most efficient mechanism to reduce emissions.

Unlock the private sector – by pricing carbon

To make real headway towards cutting emissions, Australia needs to energise the private sector.

Here, too, the best way is to price carbon. This would mean fossil fuel producers and users would have to pay for the damage their products do. Without this incentive to reduce emissions, companies will not take action.

The fault lies with government. Having identified greenhouse emissions as a major and growing problem, successive governments have refused to take the obvious step to fix it: make pollution cost money.

In 2025, it’s very unlikely any private investor will build new fossil fuel generation, other than gas peaking plants to firm renewables. No investor will build extremely expensive and slow nuclear plants.

That means the electricity grid can only meet rising demand – particularly from the enormous growth in data centres – if we add much more renewable energy, firmed by storage or gas.

Over time, the budget would improve from the proceeds of the carbon price, and productivity would grow as Australia’s expensive and somewhat arbitrary methods of cutting emissions would no longer be needed.

A carbon price is needed now to underpin our electricity market, and so our economy, improve our budget position and productivity – and to meet or surpass new emission reduction targets.

2035 is just ten years away. If the government prices carbon, Australia could achieve very rapid reductions – potentially as high as 75%.

Rod Sims, Enterprise Professor, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.