The Productivity Commission’s latest 5 yearly Report Advancing Prosperity has been released by the Australian Government.

From the risk management perspective, Volume 4 “Australia’s data and digital dividend” is particularly relevant, considering the increase in cybercrime.

The 17 April 2023 episode of ABC’s Four Corners discussed this in “Hackers Inc: Chasing the cybercrime syndicates attacking Australia“.

Volume 4 of the Report examines opportunities for Australia to get more value out of its data holdings by enhancing its secure use in developing innovative new products and services, and improving the productivity of service delivery. It concludes that enabling Australia’s communities — particularly in regional and remote areas — to benefit from digital tools and approaches, and supporting businesses to be cyber safe, will be key to ongoing digital progression.

Its recommendations include:

“Recommendation 4.5
A single interface for cyber incident reporting
The cost for businesses of complying with cyber security regulations should be reduced by streamlining incident reporting requirements, with all reporting to occur via a single online interface. The operating
system underlying this interface would then direct reports to the Australian Cyber Security Centre or other relevant government agency as required. This could provide the platform for the government to work with cyber security software providers to build incident reporting functions into commonly used software, so that reports are automatically sent to relevant agencies if an incident occurs.

Recommendation 4.2
Expanding use cases for the Australian Government Digital Identity
The Australian Government, working with the Council on Federal Financial Relations, should increase access to its Digital Identity so that State and Territory Government services that require identity verification (such as applying for a driver’s licence) and private sector services that require identity verification (such as opening a bank or utility account) are able to use the system, with appropriate access controls and safeguards.

Governments should work towards adopting a single national digital identity, rather than different jurisdictions having fragmented identity systems that require citizens to verify their identity with governments and businesses through different channels.”

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