What Really Happened On The Night Of Census?
Completing ABS census was always a tedious experience, and yet it was something that needed to be done. This year’s census, however, appeared to be much worse. In other words, the ‘Census 2016 was a total flop’. On the night of August 9, the census site had been shut down by 7.45pm due to security concerns after three significant ‘attacks’ had previously occurred throughout the day (ABC News NSW, 10 August 2016). My family and I, a family of six I might add, were in the midst of completing the census when all of a sudden, the site had redirected us to the first page. We tried to get back into it and it completely shut us out. We left it and figured we’d try again in an hour. More hours passed and we still couldn’t access the site. It was ridiculous. A whole night wasted, and half our census data had completely disappeared. This malfunction resulted in the census being unavailable to the public for more than two days (Uhlmann & Doran, 14 August 2016).
So my question is, what really was the cause of these ‘attacks’? And is this a sign that technology isn’t always a necessary mean of every societal event that occurs?