The Australian Government implements Open Banking Regime

The Government representatives are about to implement the recommendations set out in the Farrell Report titled “Review into Open Banking in Australia”, supporting the creation of a new data-sharing regime in the financial services industry. The Australian Government has set aside roughly USD 45 million over four years to develop the creation of a Consumer Data Right, which includes the establishment of the Open Banking framework.

Under the regime, Authorised Deposit-taking Institutions (ADIs) will be required (on request) to provide its individual and small business customers and other third parties (with the consent of the customer) with access to their data.

The Open Banking regime is set to be implemented in three stages over the next 2 years (2018-2020). Under the Government’s projected timeline, all major banks must make the following available to their customers:

• data on credit and debit card, deposit and transaction accounts by July 1^st 2019;

• data on mortgages by February 1^st 2020; and

• data on personal loans and all other products by July 1^st 2020.

Following this announcement, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, in consultation with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, will develop draft rules for Open Banking while the creation of data and security standards will be developed by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation’s Data61.