Chartered Accountants, Australia and New Zealand update
The community is being urged to be alert in the light of the natural disasters we have observed across Australia, that scams are also on the increase, particularly with fraudulent ‘flood relief’ packages for victims, and fake ‘charity’ sites.
ATO updates
The ATO has continued to see a downward trend in phone scam reports from 2021, with a shift towards SMS and email as the predominant channel used by scammers.
The updated Reducing Scam Calls and Scam SMS Code was circulated early March for public comment. Technical comment on the Code will be the remit of the telecommunications industry. The public comment period has now closed with the Australian Communications and Media Authority working towards consensus on the content and publication of the code.
An update was provided on the Tax Professional Cyber Awareness research that was undertaken in 2021. The initial survey results were insightful and have provided lots of opportunities for improved awareness. Draft recommendations will be distributed to Cyber Security Stakeholder Group members for comment.
Australian Cyber Security Centre
The Australia Cyber Security Centre recently issued an important alertExternal Link encouraging all Australian organisations to adopt an enhanced cyber security position considering the unfolding events in Ukraine and Russia. Advice is continually being updated as the situation evolves.
Advice and mitigations for the Apache Log4j software vulnerabilityExternal Link are available. The National Hotline 1300 CYBER1 can also provide assistance for any cyber security incident as required.
Summary of the key topics discussed at the Cyber Security Stakeholder Group meeting 25 March 2022.