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The Matildas are into the quarter-finals of a Women's World Cup blown wide open, high on confidence and believing they can handle whatever opponent is thrown at them.

To top it all off, they've just got Sam Kerr back.

Everything is opening up perfectly for Tony Gustavsson's charges after a mature 2-0 win over Denmark, in which Australia coolly outmanoeuvred the world No.13 and, bar a shaky start, were rarely troubled defensively.

While the United States, Germany, Brazil and Canada have already crumbled and exited stage left, the Matildas have charged into the final eight for just the second time and laid down their marker as a contender.

Along the way they have attracted bumper crowds and TV audiences - Channel Seven's broadcast of Monday's Denmark game reached 6.54 million viewers, the network's No.1 show of the year.

Australia professionally dealt with favouritism against the Danes, and whether they face France or Morocco on Saturday evening in Brisbane will believe they can adjust accordingly - and handle the ever-growing weight of expectation.

"We had our backs against the wall last game (against Canada), and we thrived under that pressure," goal scorer Hayley Raso said.

"But being the host nation is also a huge advantage. We've got the crowd behind us. We come into these games, and we want to win. We know we need to win.

"We've got the support of the whole country, and we definitely feel it."

Star attacker Caitlin Foord said the side "don't really feel the pressure" of expectation.

"We're just enjoying our performances and building on that," she said.

"We want to keep building and keep coming out better. We've set the bar now to what our performance is and what the bare minimum is.

"We know we have to keep taking it to another level if we want to go all the way."

Australia have had six goal scorers at the World Cup so far: Raso, Foord, Steph Catley, Mary Fowler, Emily van Egmond and Alanna Kennedy.

"Tournament football is about playing the game in front of you, whatever that looks like, and finding a way," Gustavsson said.

"This team have proven now that they can always find a way.

"Not just Sam Kerr - we have multiple options to score goals."

It may be "not just Sam Kerr", but getting back Australia's all-time leading goal scorer doesn't hurt.

Kerr entered the fray in the 80th minute on Monday, making her return from the calf injury that scuppered the start of her tournament.

"It's incredible," vice-captain Catley said.

"How many times can you get to a quarter-final and then add your best player, one of the best players in the world, back into your team; your captain?"

Van Egmond has excelled as a false No.9 but welcomed close friend Kerr's return to the fray.

"Tonight also demonstrated that we're not just a one-trick team," she said on Monday.

"Off the back of all that you add our leader back in - arguably the best striker in the world - and that's pretty scary."

Australia won't look beyond Saturday's quarter-final and towards their dream of holding up the World Cup just yet.

"That's the dream. Everyone's here to do that, right?" Kerr said.

"But ... we're taking this one game at a time and we're not going to look too far ahead because that's when you slip."

© AAP 2023

Almost half of all IT policymakers are considering bans on smartphone apps in the workplace, including restrictions on social media platform TikTok, in a bid to protect sensitive business data, a study has found.

And many of those bans could extend to employees' privately owned phones, with two in five managers considering restrictions on all devices used at work.

The findings, from a survey by BlackBerry, come a week after an Australian Senate inquiry made recommendations about Chinese and Russian owned apps, including extending a government ban on TikTok and restricting access to messaging app WeChat.

BlackBerry engineering director Jonathan Jackson said the Senate committee's findings reflected widespread concerns about data security among Australian businesses.

"We are starting to receive lots of questions from chief information security officers or chief risk officers in enterprise and the public sector who want to see what controls can be implemented," he said.

"It's really hard to control the apps that people install on their personal devices which have also got access to work data."

The software company surveyed 250 information technology decision-makers in Australia and found 49 per cent were implementing or considering bans on social media apps installed on company-owned smartphones and 42 per cent were weighing up app bans on smartphones owned by employees.

Forty-three per cent of those surveyed strongly agreed companies should be able to control the smartphone apps used by employees and 60 per cent named contacts, personal data and calendar information as most at risk.

Mr Jackson said restricting workers' use of apps on their own devices was tricky but could be achieved by separating work from personal apps or controlling their use at a network level.

Restrictions, he said, could apply to more than just social media apps and could block malicious fake banking applications and others designed to steal Facebook accounts or infiltrate cryptocurrency wallets.

"We are expecting (the number of) bans to increase," Mr Jackson said.

"A blanket ban (on TikTok) is probably unlikely at this stage and that's mainly because there needs to be a balance between what users want and what information is stored in devices from a company perspective."

Video platform TikTok, owned by Chinese firm ByteDance, was banned from use on Australian government-issued devices in April after a security direction found the app posed "significant security and privacy risks to non-corporate Commonwealth entities".

A Senate committee last week recommended the TikTok ban be extended to all contractors with access to government data and that a ban should include Chinese-owned WeChat.

TikTok Australia public policy director Ella Woods-Joyce said the company did not agree with "many of the characterisations and statements" made about the platform during the inquiry and would keep talking with the Australian government.

© AAP 2023

A daughter-in-law cooked the suspected poisonous mushroom meal that killed three people and has put a church pastor in hospital fighting for life.

Homicide squad detectives are investigating after guests at a family lunch at Leongatha in Victoria's east fell ill on July 29.

Four people went to local hospitals the following day and were transferred to Dandenong Hospital and Austin Hospital.

A 66-year-old woman from nearby Korumburra died in care on Friday and her 68-year-old husband - a Baptist Church pastor - remained in a critical condition at Austin Hospital on Monday afternoon.

The woman's 70-year-old sister and brother-in-law, also from Korumburra, died in hospital on Friday and Saturday.

Investigators interviewed the 48-year-old daughter-in-law of one of the couples who cooked the meal at her home.

She did not become ill.

No charges have been laid but police are still treating her as a suspect.

Outside her Leongatha home on Monday afternoon, the woman said she did not know what had happened.

"I didn't do anything," she told Nine's A Current Affair.

"I loved them and I'm devastated they're gone."

She declined to answer questions about what meals were served to which guests or the origin of the mushrooms.

Detective Inspector Dean Thomas said the woman was separated from her husband but police have been told their relationship is amicable.

"It could be very innocent but, again, we just don't know at this point," he told reporters on Monday.

Her children were also at the home on July 29 but did not eat the meal.

The Department of Families, Fairness and Housing has taken the children as a precaution.

Detectives searched the home on Saturday and seized multiple items which they declined to detail.

They are yet to confirm the type of mushroom the guests ate but Det Insp Thomas said the symptoms were consistent with those from eating a death cap.

"We're working closely with (the) Department of Health and of course our poisons medical experts," he said.

Det Insp Thomas warned Victorians against eating wild mushrooms.

The families of the dead are grappling with shock and grief.

"Our beloved family members, who we will not name at this time out of respect for their privacy, were cherished individuals," the Patterson and Wilkinson families said in a statement published in the South Gippsland Sentinel Times.

"They were parents, grandparents, siblings, children and pillars of faith within our community.

"Their love, steadfast faith and selfless service have left an indelible mark on our families, the Korumburra Baptist Church, the local community and indeed people around the globe."

South Gippsland mayor Nathan Hersey said the small Korumburra community was in mourning.

Following a service on Sunday, the mayor spoke with the Baptist Church congregation, who have been gathering regularly to pray for the victims.

"It's hard because we've had a lot of people experience a lot of grief all at once," Cr Hersey told AAP.

"It's shock and it's grief and it's sadness and it's not just with one person they love but with three ... they loved dearly who (have) passed away and then now another who's in a critical condition."

Victoria had a spate of death cap mushroom poisonings in 2020, with eight people in hospital at one point.

Five required intensive care and one died.

© AAP 2023