This is an interim injunction decision, so it is not a final ruling that Bankwest breached or did not breach the Privacy Act. The useful business point is the situation it exposes. Financial hardship information can be commercially serious for customers, and disputes about reporting may move quickly.
The applicant wanted the Court to stop future reporting and require steps to suppress or remove information already reported. The Court dismissed the interim application. That does not mean hardship reporting is low risk. It means the urgent injunction threshold was not met on the evidence and balance of convenience before the Court.
For lenders, brokers, fintechs and any business handling regulated credit information, the lesson is process discipline. If hardship information is going to be reported, the business should be able to show what rule permits it, what notice or communication occurred, what data was sent, who approved it and how complaints or correction requests are handled. Once a customer seeks urgent relief, loose process notes are a bad place to be.