Australia's competition watchdog puts data brokers on radar (updated)

Liveramp Holdings

10/07/2023 01:30

(Adds details, background in paragraphs 2-6)
       July 10 (Reuters) - Australia's competition watchdog on
Monday asked consumers, businesses and other relevant
stakeholders to provide their views about the business practices
of data brokers in an attempt to regulate the country's digital
platform services sector. 
    The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC)
will consider products and services supplied by major data
brokers including Oracle  ORCL.N , Equifax  EFX.N , Ireland
headquartered Experian  EXPN.L  and global tech firm LiveRamp
 RAMP.N  among other several providers to make a report on the
sector. 
    "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 generally gather information like personal
details of customers including their browsing and purchasing
behaviour from a wide range of sources such as mobile
applications, social media sites and card payment providers.
    The 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, the
ACCC said in a statement.
    The regulator's digital platforms branch has been conducting
a five-year inquiry till 2025 to inquire into the markets for
the supply of digital services. 
    The report will focus on businesses that collect information
from third-party sources and share or sell data to other
organisations and, on the off chance that there might be
competition and customer issues emerging from it. It will be
handed over to the treasurer in March 2024, the ACCC added. 
    

 (Reporting by Rishav Chatterjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi
Aich)
 ((Rishav.Chatterjee@thomsonreuters.com;))