The Australian Securities & Investments Commission (ASIC) is creating a new Chief Data Office as part of plans to evolve the way the regulator will capture, share and use data in the period leading up to 2020.

The announcement accompanied the launch of a new Data Strategy report, which ASDIC says is a “high-level, principles-based document that describes how we plan to be more data-driven and intelligence-led in the future.”

“This data strategy supports ASIC’s alignment with whole-of-government initiatives, including the Public Data Policy and the Digital Continuity 2020 Policy.”

The strategy includes establishing a data science lab, new governance forums and implementing data exchange frameworks with other Australian government agencies.

As part of the “One ASIC Regulatory Transformation Program” it plans to establish a single repository that brings together the regulatory data ASIC capture and creates, with a new search tool providing a consolidated view of entities it regulates.

Also on the agenda a single integrated customer relationship management (CRM) system to replace many of ASIC’s legacy workflow systems, plus the development of a new online portal.

According to ASIC’s Data Stategy report, “The next few years will see significant change to the ways we capture, share and use data. We will achieve our vision by improving our data governance, enhancing data quality, expanding digitisation and ensuring our data is integrated, catalogued and accessible. Data sharing will be improved within ASIC, while maintaining data security and privacy.

“We will provide an enhanced set of data management and analytics tools and expand data science skills across ASIC to ensure our staff have the skills, tools and data sets required to undertake their work.

“Additionally, we will engage closely with industry and other regulators on data collection to ensure we only capture information we need in a manner that is clear and streamlined.

The full Data Strategy 2017-20 report is available HERE