ACCC calls for input on data broking

The ACCC has published an issues paper seeking views on the data broker industry as part of its five-year Digital Platform Services enquiry.

The paper is available for download here and is designed to elicit stakeholder responses that will inform the ACCC’s March 2024 interim report. The focus is on data brokers that collect information about people from various third-party sources. Data brokers use this information to create data products and services which they sell or share with other organisations (third-party data brokers).

This is the eighth interim report and will examine:

• sources of data broker information
• the types of information collected
• methods of collection, storage, processing and analysing information
• types of data broker products and services supplied and how these are used
• competitive dynamics in the data broker industry in Australia
• potential consumer or small business harms that may arise.
   

“There is little transparency and awareness of how data brokers operate in Australia despite the vast amounts of information they collect about Australian consumers and the central role they play in enabling the exchange of information between businesses,” ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said.

Data brokers collect information from a range of sources including from social media sites, internet and search services, apps, customer loyalty programs, card payment providers and public records, like electoral rolls.

Types of information collected include names, home and work addresses, age, browsing behaviour, purchasing behaviour and a range of other socio-economic and demographic information.

Some of the products and services data brokers create include audience profiling reports, consumer purchasing data and risk and fraud management products for tenancy or insurance applications.

The report will focus on businesses that collect information from third-party sources and sell or share that data with other organisations (third-party data brokers).

Businesses that collect data on their own customers and use that within their own business, or sell or share that data with others (first-party brokers), will not be a focus.

“Some Australian consumers may not be aware that their information is being collected, stored and sold by third-party data brokers with whom they have no direct relationship. This report will explore how third-party data brokers collect and use information to create products and services and if there may be competition and consumer issues arising from this,” Cass-Gottlieb said.

The ACCC will consider the products and services supplied by several data brokers including CoreLogic, Equifax, Experian, Illion, LiveRamp, Nielsen, PropTrack, Oracle and Quantium.

“We are eager to hear from data brokers and consumers and businesses that interact with the data broker industry. We are also seeking to understand how data products and services may be beneficial for small businesses,” Cass-Gottlieb said.

Businesses that sell or provide data to data brokers and businesses that purchase or use data brokers’ products or services are especially encouraged to respond to the issues paper by 7 August 2023.

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