Consultation on screen scraping regulation

In October 2023 , AusPayNet responded to Treasury’s consultation on options for regulating screen scraping practices in Australia.

AusPayNet has a strategic commitment to working with Members, Government, and other stakeholders to improve cybersecurity in the payments ecosystem and defend against the growing threat of economic crime. As noted in Treasury’s consultation paper, screen scraping practices – which involve customers sharing their login details with third parties – generate risks that run counter to these objectives. In particular, screen scraping encourages customers to act in a way that is inconsistent with cybersecurity best practice, and can increase customer vulnerability to cybersecurity attacks, fraud, and scams as a result of personal authentication and other sensitive data being accessed, stored and used by third-party applications.

In our submission, we highlighted that efficiency and customer convenience should not come at the expense of data security, particularly in the current environment of rapidly growing cyber and economic crime threats. We therefore expressed support for a carefully managed phase out of riskier practices, such as screen scraping, where the Consumer Data Right (CDR) can provide a secure alternative for facilitating customer data sharing.

AusPayNet’s submission is available below.