With the federal election looming, there are two things I want to warn Australians about—lies and data harvesting. There's no law preventing lies in political ads. This is mind blowing. Businesses can't tell lies; that's called 'misleading and deceptive conduct'. But politicians can say whatever they want without any repercussions. I've introduced two bills to protect voters from lies in political ads. The government has finally introduced its own bill, but it's not going to be passed in this parliament. So voters must look out for the lies. If it doesn't sound right, email the person involved, and ask them about it. The other issue is data harvesting. Political parties have made themselves exempt from privacy laws, and they engage in some pretty dodgy practices. It's common for both major parties to send out a postal vote application form with an addressed envelope that goes to the party, not the AEC. Then the party records all your personal data before sending the form on to the AEC, and there's no law against this. There should be, and I've put my own up, but neither major party wants to stop harvesting your data. So, this election, remember that attack ads might be lies. I will not do this in my campaign. If you want to vote by post, go straight to the AEC, and don't be tricked into sending your personal data to political parties.