Big tech can’t stop people hating data centres

September 3, 2026 — 3:54pm

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The world’s largest AI companies are getting worried.

It turns out that telling people your transformative technology will either destroy their jobs or hack critical infrastructure does not make people like your transformative technology very much.

In the United States, public frustration about the relentless pace of the AI revolution has coalesced into widespread local anger at new data centres, which have become the least popular neighbours since nuclear reactors.

In a country bitterly divided along political faultlines, data centre scepticism has become a rare point of bipartisan consensus.

Both big tech players and the Albanese government are now keeping a close eye on the extent to which that febrile opposition catches on in Australia.

In Tasmania, the IPO-bound, $15 billion Australian data centre start-up Firmus has encountered sweeping local opposition to its planned “AI factories,” based not on co-founder Oliver Curtis’ past insider........

© The Sydney Morning Herald