[LINK] MyHealthRecord opt-out Site

[Roger Clarke]

At 11:12 +1000 4/4/16, Bernard Robertson-Dunn wrote:
>If you wish to opt-out of the MyHealthRecord trials you can go to this site.
>http://www2.medicareaustralia.gov.au/pext/optoutextweb/optout.xhtml
>
>A few clicks takes you to a page where you can fill in identity details
>
>That page asks for name, date of birth and Medicare number and one of
>driver licence number
>passport number
>or immicard number
>
>Would someone please confirm that all this is being done in the clear?
>i.e. it's not https

Some other questions intrude:

Firstly:  Why does one have to submit to Medicare, one of the agencies within the DHS mega-portfolio, when the health care record that you're instructing be suppressed is managed by an agency within the Health portfolio?

If Medicare is acting purely as an outsourced service provider, where is the assurance that the data will be merely passed through Medicare and never stored there??

Secondly, is there sufficient justification for demanding an additional identifier - presumably as an authenticator?  (I have an open mind on that question, but it has to be asked).

Thirdly, if a demand for an additional identifier is justifiable, then it's completely unacceptable for a single identifier to be specified.  A small percentage, but a large number, of people do not have a driver's licence.  And it's unclear whether the equivalent ('non-driver's licence') is acceptable.

Fourthly, the whole population is subject to this nonsensical threat of an (extraordinarily invasive and almost useless) consolidation of sensitive data in an administrative database.  But the whole population does *not* have a Medicare Card number, because some categories of people don't qualify for one.

So how on earth can that be the sole criterion for identifying the applicant for suppression of a medical record??


Back to the question:

The first and second pages in the workflow do both display http:// in the input box at the top of the page.

However, that isn't conclusive evidence that the contents are transmitted in clear.

In particular, it's possible for the browser to be programmed by the server to transmit using https, despite http:// appearing in the window.

(I had an argument with an ISP several years ago, because they were displaying http:// in their login window, but asserted that it was transmitted using https, and anyway it didn't matter that the display was misleading because consumers don't notice such things anyway).

To check whether the data really is exposed, it's necessary to use a utility to log and display the traffic. 

(But a betting man would reckon there's a very good chance it's in clear).


-- 
Roger Clarke                                 http://www.rogerclarke.com/
			             
Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd      78 Sidaway St, Chapman ACT 2611 AUSTRALIA
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Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Law            University of N.S.W.
Visiting Professor in Computer Science    Australian National University