A new ACMA research paper has found advances in regulatory technology have application in the Australian communications and media sectors in areas such as compliance, reporting and risk management outcomes.
The paper highlights research showing Australia is third in the world for the number of Regulatory Technology (RegTech) providers based in the country, only behind the USA and UK.
RegTech can be developed by companies to meet regulatory requirements with or without involving regulators. Governments can also develop RegTech for their own use – often using RegTech providers to develop these government applications.
With technologies such as artificial intelligence (Al) and machine learning helping accelerate the sector, the paper aims to ensure the ACMA is on top of the latest RegTech developments. It includes case studies from around the world that could potentially be applied to Australia’s communications and media regulatory environment.
One example includes an Australian life insurance provider using AI and voice recognition to analyse its phone-based sales calls to improve consumer outcomes and ensure regulatory compliance. The paper notes the potential for the technology to be applied to a telecommunications environment, particularly in monitoring issues relating to spam, complaints, quality and staff training.
Another case study is Child Link, an online register created by the Victorian Government. It will bring together data from existing systems and services to form a single source of aggregated information about a child and their engagement in childhood services. The paper suggests that a similar identity management system could be helpful within the media and communications environment for verifying customer information.
The New tech applications for regulatory outcomes paper is a part of a series under the ACMA’s research program that aims to build our understanding of digital developments to aid regulatory decision-making.