ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on March 23, 2026.
Your smart home can be easily hacked. New safety standards will help, but stay vigilant
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Yang Xiang, Professor, Computer Science, Swinburne University of Technology On a quiet suburban street, a modern Australian home wakes before its owners do. The lights turn on automatically, the thermostat adjusts to a comfortable temperature, and the coffee machine begins brewing. A doorbell camera watches the front
Wondering if you really need that dental treatment? Here’s what to ask and how to get a second opinion
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chanae Ihimaera, Senior Lecturer/Kaiwhakaako Oral Health, Auckland University of Technology If the dental bill has ever made you gulp, you’re far from alone. Around three in ten Australian adults say they avoid or delay dental care due to costs. In Aotearoa New Zealand, almost half of adults
Family violence protection orders can be a lifeline, but the system needs reforming
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Heather Douglas, Professor of Law and Deputy Director of the Centre of Excellence for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (CEVAW), The University of Melbourne Every year across Australia, more than 100,000 people obtain a family violence protection order. For some victim-survivors, protection orders provide a much-needed
Child protection workers are under pressure in NZ. Can predictive modelling help?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dylan A Mordaunt, Research Fellow, Faculty of Education, Health, and Psychological Sciences, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington; Flinders University; The University of Melbourne Across child protection services, frontline staff are often making decisions in the hardest possible conditions: under time pressure, with incomplete information
Prime Minister Manele holds firm as opposition claims majority in Solomon Islands
RNZ Pacific Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele has doubled down on his decision not to convene Parliament as he hangs on to power leading a minority government, following mass defections from his Government of National Unity and Transformation (GNUT). Last week, 19 government MPs — more than half of them cabinet ministers — handed
From nuclear to climate crisis survivors: unfinished business in the Pacific
COMMENTARY: By David Robie, author of Eyes of Fire Climate crisis concerns shouldn’t overshadow the legacy of nuclear testing in the Pacific, where there are lingering health and sociopolitical insecurities. For example, there are concerns in French Polynesia about the mysterious fate of a former anti-nuclear investigative journalist and editor of the now closed Les
Using your AI chatbot as a search engine? Be careful what you believe
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kevin Veale, Senior Lecturer in Media Studies, School of Humanities, Media and Creative Communication, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University During the first world war, the British government was looking for ways to help people stretch their limited food supplies. It found pamphlets from a noted
Morgan le Fay was King Arthur’s sister – but also a healer, mathematician and murderer
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicole Kimball, Casual Academic, School of Humanities, Creative Industries and Social Sciences, University of Newcastle Morgan le Fay is one of the most infamous characters of Arthurian mythology. A powerful sorceress and, in later stories, King Arthur’s half-sister, Morgan was a healer, a mathematician, murderer, adulteress and
Some schools have stopped running camps as costs rise. What can we do instead?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Education, Charles Sturt University School camps have long been a rite of passage for many Australian students in both primary and high school. Typically, camps begin in primary school and continue into the secondary years, ranging from a single overnight stay to
Do petrol retailers really ‘price-gouge’ during oil price spikes?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nikhil Datta, Assistant Professor, Economics, University of Warwick The US-Israel strikes on Iran in late February caused an immediate spike in oil prices, and volatility has only increased since then. It quickly led to fears among motorists of “price-gouging” – petrol retailers raising their prices to take
Overconfidence is how wars are lost − lessons from Vietnam, Afghanistan and Ukraine for the war in Iran were ignored
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Monica Duffy Toft, Professor of International Politics and Director of the Center for Strategic Studies, The Fletcher School, Tufts University Wars are rarely lost first on the battlefield. They are lost in leaders’ minds − when leaders misread what they and their adversaries can do, when their
TVs keep getting more pixels – but we are approaching the limits of what our eyes can actually see
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Renee Goreham, Associate Professor, Physics, University of Newcastle I remember sitting very close to the television as a child and seeing the image was made up of tiny coloured dots, each of which broke down into miniature vertical strips of red, green and blue when I looked
Is it OK to drink in front of your kids? New research shows the age they’re most influenced
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sergey Alexeev, Senior research fellow, University of Sydney; UNSW Sydney It’s a Friday evening and you pour a glass of wine while your teenager sits at the kitchen bench scrolling their phone. They barely look up. But they notice more than you think. My new study found
How much do you really need to retire? It’s probably a lot less than $1 million
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Angel Zhong, Professor of Finance, RMIT University Every few months, someone in the superannuation industry declares that Australians now “need” around A$1 million to retire comfortably. It’s a big, scary number. But consumer advocates say most people can retire with far less. Independent estimates suggest something closer
In the next pandemic, NZ doesn’t need to choose between health and the economy
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Paula Lorgelly, Professor of Health Economics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau This time six years ago, as officials prepared to move New Zealand into lockdown, the public was suddenly introduced to the complex and somewhat bewildering world of pandemic modelling. These highly mathematical models mapped out
View from The Hill: One Nation’s performance in SA will send shivers down Angus Taylor’s spine for Farrer campaign
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra As he looks to his own coming wrestle with One Nation in the May 9 Farrer byelection, Angus Taylor can only take from Saturday’s South Australian result a sense of deep trepidation. One Nation drove a front-end loader through the
Eugene Doyle: Trump celebrates Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour
COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle You can’t make this stuff up. The President of the United States, while sitting next to the Japanese Prime Minister in the Oval Office, just celebrated the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour. When asked by a Japanese reporter on Friday why the US didn’t consult with allies before launching the surprise
No bigger hypocrisy in the world than Israel complaining about Iran’s ‘lawbreaking’
COMMENTARY: By Sarah Leah Whitson In recent days, Israel and the United States have expressed outrage over the deliberate and indiscriminate targeting of civilians and civilian residences and infrastructure in Israel and the Gulf by Iranian forces. They have cited the illegality of such attacks, urged global condemnation, and demanded that human rights organisations speak
