Australia’s Minister for Government Services and NDIS Bill Shorten has issued press releases to highlight milestones for the myGov app and to mark the launch of an $11.4 million proof-of-concept for the national digital trust exchange TEx – a turn of events that has surprised some observers.
Registrations with the myGov app now account for more than 30% of the total
Shorten said 5.6 million people now use the myGov app to log into myGov, and more than 122 million logins have been registered in the past 18 months. The minister says the successes show how the myGov app is changing the way Australians engage with government.
“Over a third of the average 864,000 daily logins to myGov are now done via the myGov app, and over half of the app logins use the quick and easy biometric security features such as fingerprint or facial recognition,” he says.
Shorten points out that the recent introduction of passkeys in myGov enables secure passwordless login, again using biometric or screen lock features. “If your myGov passkey is stored in your password manager and available across devices, in most cases you can use the same passkey to log in to both the myGov app and the myGov website.”
The department has also made progress on its digital wallet program, adding DVA digital white and gold veterans cards. “Since December 2022, more than 1.5 million digital items have been added to the myGov wallet and viewed over 3.4 million times,” Shorten says. “The myGov wallet will become increasingly important as we explore new ways you can use the verified government credentials in your myGov wallet in your everyday life.”
Shorten is also optimistic about myGov’s security prospects, despite past issues that resulted in billions of dollars in fraud losses. “We are on the right track with the security and fraud detection improvements already funded as part of the budget,” he says, “as well as other security improvements to ensure myGov remains trusted, safe and secure.”
Australia’s 2024 budget allocates $630 million (US$416 million) over four years and $145 million (US$96 million) per year to fund upgrades to myGov’s security and messaging features.
Google is one of the TEx consulting organizations
Speaking to the National Press Club in Canberra on Tuesday, Shorten outlined the announcement of the digital trust exchange, which is currently in the proof-of-concept phase but is expected to be fully launched by the end of the year.
According to the minister, “the technology behind TEx would eliminate all the hassle of searching for dozens of documents to prove your identity when, for example, opening a bank account, buying a mobile phone or even trying to rent a property. TEx will connect the bank, telecom operator or real estate agent to your digital wallet and you then agree to share only the identity features or credentials you want.”
Shorten also says Telstra and Google “welcomed the opportunity to be involved in the development of TEx.”
TEx says mDLs: This wallet is not big enough for both of us
TEx has definitely arrived with a bang, sweeping previous plans to integrate mobile driving licenses (mDLs) into myGov off the table – and causing a stir among opponents who say it is too risky.
Shorten, for example, believes the trust exchange is a huge improvement over the old plan. InnovationAus quotes him as saying the originally proposed digital credential system would have been “essentially just an image of a card” shared across state and federal apps.
“TEx will achieve the result of card swapping and much more,” he says, noting that the government wants to take as much of the development of the system itself as possible. Users can select the digital wallet of their choice in which to store the verifiable credentials, and the system is completely optional.
The national digital trust exchange is part of the Albanese government’s broader digital ID strategy, which also includes myGovID, the digital credential used by more than 10 million Australians.
Shorten points to major data breaches as evidence that “we need to do things differently,” saying “the beauty of TEx is that it is part of a broader interoperable digital ID system,” which “means a reduction in the collection, storage and sharing of data across the economy.”
Critics want more detailed information and cooperation with the private sector
Not everyone is as excited about TEx’s potential as Shorten. Following the announcement of the digital trust exchange, opinions are divided. Some argue that more public consultation is needed, while others dismiss the exchange’s lofty ambitions for a digital ID as impossible.
One notable criticism points to a significant problem with the development of biometrics and digital ID in general: the government is poor at explaining them. Yahoo Finance Australia quotes Susan McLean, founder of Cyber Safety Solutions, who says TEx is “very promising” but worries that “very little detail is provided about the backend, what it is, how it works and what security settings it might have.”
“There is nothing that can be 100 percent certain,” she says, pointing out that there is generally “no trust in the ability of a government to act.”
Other experts call TEx a honeypot, while opposition parties put forward their preferred views. For example, Shadow Minister for Public Services Paul Fletcher of the Liberal Party says it is limiting to try to keep development in the hands of government and points to the private sector as a source of innovation. (For Fletcher’s detailed views on the technology, see his lengthy speech at the TechLeaders 2024 conference.)
“When we talk about sectors that are not harnessing the power of digitalisation and technology to operate more efficiently, we cannot ignore government,” Fletcher says in an article in The Mandarin.
Public trust in government is in tatters after Robodebit, says Professor
Perhaps the most pertinent criticism of the Trust Exchange Scheme comes from Toby Murray, associate professor of cybersecurity at the School of Computing and Information Systems at the University of Melbourne. In an article in The National Tribute, Murray writes: “Success will depend on one critical factor: public trust.”
He cites the Robodebit scandal as a key reason people may not trust government technology enough to invest in TEx. “In the wake of the Robodebt scandal, it is incumbent on the government to reassure Australians that the Trust Exchange system is trustworthy and will keep their sensitive information safe,” he writes. This requires carefully explaining what information the system does and does not collect about individuals, who has access to that information, and how it will be protected.”
Article topics
Australia | biometric authentication | biometrics | digital government | digital ID | digital wallets | myGov (Australia) | passkeys
