The Commonwealth Bank is piloting the use of myGov to verify customers’ identities through a program led by Services Australia.
Known as trust exchange – or TEx –, the pilot allows trial participants to use the myGov app to scan a QR code at one of the bank’s Canberra branches.
Participants then agree to share information from a “test Medicare card” electronically with the bank.
“The bank then gets government-verified information—including the customer’s name and confirmation of a valid Medicare enrolment—without receiving information they do not need, from the Medicare card, such as the Medicare number,” said outgoing National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) minister Bill Shorten.
The TEx proof-of-concept was first announced by Minister Shorten in August and uses $11.4 million of seed funding.
The TEx follows a similar formula to digital identity exchanges being promoted by the private sector in that it is “not a wallet or app or ID” but simply a mechanism to allow a person to verify who they are.
In this case, people’s identities can be established using information held by the federal government.
In August, Minister Shorten said TEx would use an “opt-in system” but that he hoped its utility and convenience would guarantee take-up.
Once the testing phase is completed, the federal government will “determine the next phase of this work,” the minister said on January 17.