'Bin brother' keeps watchful eye on Aussie rubbish

SYDNEY (AFP) — Tens of thousands of Australian households will have their rubbish and recycling monitored by tracking devices placed in their dustbins in a move dubbed by the media as "Bin Brother".

Officials on Monday confirmed that 78,000 new council-issued bins in the eastern suburbs of Sydney have been fitted with small radio frequency tags, which allow for data collection.

Each bin will transmit a unique identification code to the rubbish truck which weighs and empties it each week, allowing officials to identify how much waste is produced at each address.

The technology, which ...