In the brave new world of social media and camera phones it is practically impossible to attend an event and not see people whipping out their phones and taking a photograph, now within seconds that photograph can be published world wide. It's not just the National Security Agency, we are all collecting information on people, so it must not be overlooked that there are legal implications and rights which must be considered in the process of publishing photographs.
The first rule to remember is that under copyright law, the person who takes the photograph will usually own it and the right to publish it. The big exception to this rule is if the photograph was taken while the photographer was performing their role as an employee or contractor. This doesn't mean that the owner of the photograph is entitled to publish their photograph at will though.
The Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) considers a photograph to potentially contain 'personal information' such as the identity of and information about a person. This information belongs to the person, not the photographer and the photograph should not be published without the consent of the person or people whose 'personal information' is contained in the photograph.
Of course, being the law, there are innumerable grey areas and considerations that must be processed before determining whether the photograph contains personal information and if it does whether consent is required to publish it. This exercise will need to be performed on a case by case basis. A good starting point is asking whether you would be concerned about the photograph being published if you were in it: if in doubt – get consent, particularly when children are involved
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