Australian Government entities are attractive, high-value targets for a range of malicious cybercriminals because they hold the personal and financial information of Australians. In 2022–23, approximately 31 per cent of cyber security incidents reported to the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) were from non-corporate Commonwealth entities. Over 40 per cent of these cyber security incidents were coordinated, low-level malicious cyberattacks directed specifically at the Australian government, government shared services, or regulated critical infrastructure. Ransomware was the most destructive cybercrime threat in 2022–23, and continues to pose considerable risk to Australian government entities, businesses and individuals.

Previous audits conducted by the ANAO identified low levels of cyber resilience in entities. Low levels of cyber resilience continue to make entities susceptible to cyberattack and reduce business continuity and recovery prospects following a cyber security incident. An entity’s preparedness to respond to and recover from a cyberattack is a key part of cyber resilience. This audit was conducted to provide assurance to Parliament about the effectiveness of the selected entities’ implementation of arrangements for managing cyber security incidents.

In preparing audit reports to the Parliament on cyber security in Australian Government entities, the interests of accountability and transparency must be balanced with the need to manage cyber security risks. The ASD has advised the ANAO that adversaries use publicly available information about cyber vulnerabilities to more effectively target their malicious activities.

The extent to which this report details the cyber security vulnerabilities of individual entities was a matter of careful consideration during the course of this audit. To assist in appropriately balancing the interests of accountability and potential risk exposure through transparent audit reporting, the ANAO engaged with ASD to better understand the evolving nature and extent of risk exposure that may arise through the disclosure of technical information in the audit report. This report therefore focusses on matters material to the audit findings against the objective and criteria and contains less detailed technical information than previous audits.

Key findings:

The implementation of arrangements by AUSTRAC and Services Australia to manage cyber security incidents has been partly effective. Neither entity is well placed to ensure business continuity or disaster recovery in the event of a significant or reportable cyber security incident.
AUSTRAC has partly effective cyber security incident management procedures for investigating, monitoring and responding to cyber security incidents. It has established management structures and a framework of procedures to support these processes. It has not detailed the responsibilities for its Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), its approach to continuous monitoring and improvement reporting, or defined timeframes for reporting to stakeholders.
Services Australia is partly effective in its design of cyber security incident management procedures. It has established a framework of procedures and an incident response plan. It has not documented an approach to threat and vulnerability assessments. Services Australia does
not have a policy covering the management of cyber security incidents.

Auditor-General Report No. 38 2023–24

Canberra: Australian National Audit Office, 2024. 103p.

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CRIME

Management of cyber security incidents