The Government has released for consultation changes to the consumer data right (CDR), including how data is shared with professional advisers, a year since its introduction as part of the Government’s review into open banking.
The CDR helped consumers to make better-informed choices by providing access to the data that businesses hold about them, helping save time and money, and the proposed changes could potentially impact the ease for how financial advisers access client data.
Further changes for consultation, included changes to enable more Australians to leverage their data in common banking scenarios, such as data sharing from joint accounts, and allowing consumers to disclose limited data insights for specific purposes (such as to verify their account balance).
Cost barriers to full participation in open banking were also being reduced with the introduction of a new sponsored tier of accreditation, and a CDR representative model.
These amendments would expand the ways in which service providers would be able to use the CDR to offer benefits to consumers.
The Government said all of the safeguards core to the CDR remained in place and were among the “most stringent” in the world.
The CDR begun with the big four banks, and yesterday 16 data holders and 11 additional brands had been added-on, which now represented 85% of Australian household deposits.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) continued to work on adding any remaining non-major ADIs meet their data-sharing requirements.
Senator Jane Hume, Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy, said the CDR was a transformative approach to data that placed the consumer at the centre of the system.
“The system is built from the ground up with incredible security and with the user in control of their data,” Hume said.
“Through the CDR, Australians can leverage their data to effortlessly access better, more specific products, potentially saving thousands.
“Open banking is just the beginning. The CDR is an economy-wide reform – as it grows it will become more powerful for Australian consumers, with energy consumers set to benefit next.”
