Digital Blog

Australian tech news, every hour

Students taking notes on laptops in a university lecture hall
Cybersecurity

ShinyHunters breach of Canvas LMS hits Australian schools and universities

Australian universities, state education departments and private schools are among the customers caught up in a global breach of Instructure's Canvas platform. ShinyHunters claims to have taken 3.65 terabytes of data covering 275 million users.

Reza Khalil4 min read
Detailed view of a server rack with NVIDIA-style GPU hardware in a data centre
Ai

Anthropic locks in SpaceX Colossus 1 for 300MW of new Claude compute

Anthropic will take all available capacity at SpaceX's Colossus 1 data centre in Memphis, adding more than 300 megawatts and 220,000 NVIDIA GPUs within a month. The Claude maker also lifted rate limits on its paid plans the same day.

Asha Iyer
Australian dollar banknotes fanned out on a table
Fintech

APRA warns mortgage brokers on AI risk as CBA scales fraud-detection agent

Yusra Ahmadi
Apple iPhone resting on a wooden surface with the screen lit
Consumer Tech

Apple agrees $US250m settlement over Siri AI features that didn't ship on time

Pip Sanderson
Modern hotel room with wall-mounted television, similar to Foxtel Business iQ rooms in Fortescue mining camps
Enterprise

Foxtel signs largest-ever Business iQ deployment in Fortescue mining camps deal

Foxtel Group has signed a multi-year renewal with Fortescue to roll out its Business iQ platform across 11,500 screens at the iron-ore miner's 11 remote accommodation villages. Foxtel calls it the largest single Business iQ deployment in its history.

Soren Chau

Consumer Tech

View all →
Aerial view of Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House at sunset
Consumer Tech

Microsoft Flight Simulator lands World Update 21 with Australia focus and NSW RFS mission

Microsoft Flight Simulator's free World Update 21 adds 30-plus Australian points of interest, the locally built CAC Boomerang fighter, and a water-bombing mission built with the NSW Rural Fire Service.

Pip Sanderson
Reviews

Meta Ray-Ban Display review: are smart glasses with a screen finally useful in Australia?

Meta's first smart glasses with a built-in screen and a Neural Band wrist controller are the most genuinely futuristic thing I have worn in 12 years. They also are not officially sold in Australia, cost about $A1,400 to land, and are not the right pair for most readers.

Pip Sanderson
Close-up of a person wearing futuristic smart glasses with a glowing in-lens display
Reviews

Sony WH-1000XM6 review: still the best noise-cancelling headphones for Australia?

Sony's sixth-generation flagship lands in Australia at $A699.95 with a new QN3 chip, 12 microphones and a folding hinge. After three weeks, two long-haul flights and a lot of tram time, here is the verdict.

Pip Sanderson
Black Sony over-ear noise cancelling headphones photographed on a clean white surface
Reviews

AirPods Pro 3 review: hearing aid mode and live translation tested in Australia

Pip Sanderson tests Apple's AirPods Pro 3 around Melbourne for a month: TGA-cleared Hearing Aid mode, live translation in 10 languages, and a $30 lift on the Pro 2. The short answer is yes, with caveats.

Pip Sanderson
Apple AirPods Pro earbuds in their charging case on a dark surface

Policy

View all →
Australian Parliament House in Canberra under blue sky
Policy

Australia names Cyber Incident Review Board to formalise post-breach lessons

The federal government has named Telstra's Narelle Devine to chair a new Cyber Incident Review Board, formalising no-fault post-mortems of major attacks under the Cyber Security Act 2024. Six other members were appointed from NBN Co, Boeing, Allens, Toll, SA Power Networks and UNSW.

Marnie Blackwood
Australian Parliament House in Canberra with the national flag against a clear blue sky
Policy

Australian startups warn CGT overhaul could blunt R&D tax incentive boost

Australian startup founders and tax advisers say proposed cuts to the 50 per cent capital gains tax discount risk undercutting an expected lift to the R&D Tax Incentive cap, days before Treasurer Jim Chalmers hands down the 12 May 2026 federal budget.

Marnie Blackwood
Canva logo displayed on a stage screen at a presentation event
Startups

ASIC fines Canva $792,000 over late accounts as filings show $US242m loss

ASIC has fined Canva Group A$792,000 over the late lodgement of its 2024 accounts, with each of four entities paying A$198,000. The long-delayed filings show the Sydney design software company posted a US$242 million net loss on revenue of US$2.1 billion.

Jules Hartman
Bitcoin coin resting on a backlit keyboard with a cryptocurrency trading app on a smartphone
Policy

ASIC sets June deadline for crypto exchanges as digital asset law nears commencement

ASIC has given Australian crypto exchanges until 30 June 2026 to begin licensing under existing financial services rules, ahead of the Corporations Amendment (Digital Assets Framework) Act 2026 commencing on 9 April 2027.

Yusra Ahmadi

Reviews

View all →
Google Pixel smartphone in Obsidian black on a clean light surface, camera bar visible, similar in design to the Pixel 10 Pro XL reviewed
Reviews

Google Pixel 10 Pro XL review: the AI camera phone for Australians

Three weeks with Google's biggest Pixel: Tensor G5, Magic Editor, Pro Res Zoom and Gemini all baked in. At $A1,999 for 256GB, it is the AI camera phone Australians should look at first this year.

Pip Sanderson
Two Apple smartphones photographed in close-up against a neutral background, showing the rear Apple logo and unibody design
Reviews

iPhone 17 Pro Max review: is Apple's biggest phone worth $A2,199 in Australia?

Apple's 6.9-inch flagship returns to a heat-forged aluminium unibody, runs the new A19 Pro chip and pushes battery life past a day and a half. At $A2,199 for 256GB at JB Hi-Fi and Apple Australia, the iPhone 17 Pro Max is the best big phone Apple has made.

Pip Sanderson

Cybersecurity

View all →
Modern server room network rack with blue illumination
Cybersecurity

SafePay lists Australian energy management firm Energy Action on leak site

Ransomware crew SafePay has added Australian consultancy Energy Action to its dark web leak site, claiming a breach of the firm that says it manages more than 10 per cent of Australia's commercial energy spend.

Reza Khalil
Cybersecurity

More than half of Australian SMEs lack a dedicated security team, Zoho report finds

More than half of Australian SMEs lack a dedicated security team, and one in three confirmed a cyberattack in the past year, a Zoho-commissioned survey of 3,322 IT and security professionals has found.

Reza Khalil
Person working on a laptop with security padlock icons overlay

Startups

View all →
A lawyer in a dark suit works at a laptop in a modern office, with a Lady Justice figurine on the desk.
Startups

Sweden's Legora buys Melbourne legaltech Graceview, plans Australian build-out

Stockholm-based legal AI company Legora has acquired Melbourne regulatory-monitoring startup Graceview, its third bolt-on in three months and its first foothold in Australia. Terms were not disclosed.

Jules Hartman
Enaxiom co-founders Tia Collings and Bijan Rahimi with an engineer in Sydney
Startups

Sydney cooling startup Enaxiom raises $A2.5m seed led by Epic Angels

Sydney climate-tech startup Enaxiom has closed an oversubscribed US$1.8 million seed led by Epic Angels to commercialise its HydroCool data-centre cooling system. Antler and BlackNova joined the round.

Jules Hartman

Latest

Telco

Optus and Ericsson claim world-first 5G SA 180MHz aggregation on live network

Optus and Ericsson said on Wednesday they completed a world-first 5G standalone trial that aggregates 180MHz across 2.3GHz and 3.5GHz on Optus's live network, hitting 3.4 Gbps downlink with off-the-shelf Samsung handsets.

Hamish Doolan
Server racks inside a modern data centre with blue indicator lights
Enterprise

Pipedrive opens Sydney data centre, says local hosting cuts latency 60 per cent

Pipedrive has switched Australian users onto a Sydney AWS region, cutting latency by up to 60 per cent and pulling local customer data onshore. The Estonian CRM vendor said Australia is now its seventh-largest market.

Soren Chau
White wireless home internet router with four antennas on a desk
Telco

Telstra adds $A70 and $A80 capped 5G home internet plans

Telstra has expanded its 5G home internet line-up with two cheaper, speed-capped tiers. The new $A70 plan caps download speeds at 25Mbps and the $A80 plan at 50Mbps, both with a 1TB monthly allowance.

Hamish Doolan