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Cyber Safer Seniors

Project Description

CyberSaferSeniors is a project of Fairer Future, sponsored by the Better Regulation Division of the New South Wales Department of Customer Service, with the aim of equipping, enabling, and encouraging seniors to act in their own interests to avoid cyber harm themselves and assist others.

1. Context for the CyberSaferSeniors project (CyberSaferSeniors)

  • In 2021, consumer agencies in Australia, dealt with 600,000 complaints of internet-based scams with reported losses of $1.8 billion. Actual losses are much higher as it is estimated that a third of victims do not report them.
  • In 2021 Australians made more than 286,600 reports to Scamwatch and reported losses of around $324 million. By the end of August this year, Australians had lost even more with reported losses of over $381 million.
  • Scams are on a steep upward growth path, having risen by a third since 2020 and the average loss per individual is close to $13,000.
  • People aged 65 and over, that is a section of the NSW population with a high proportion who are vulnerable, made the most reports of scams to the ACCC run program Scamwatch. In 2021 there were 92,000 reports of scams in NSW.
2. Goals of the project
  • CyberSaferSeniors has the goal of equipping, enabling, and encouraging NSW seniors to act in their own interests to avoid cyber harm themselves and assist others.
  • The project, a proof-of-concept, seeks to achieve this purpose through research, engagement, consultation, collaboration, and the application of leading-edge training techniques.
  • Materials and techniques developed during the project will be suitable for wider use as part of the fight against cyber harm to seniors
  • National regulators and state consumer agencies are active in identifying and attempting to close down scams, where they can be identified. Such regulatory activities are necessarily at the broad population level, are often after the event and in any case not capable of providing tailored and trusted guidance to seniors in NSW.
  • CyberSaferSeniors is an initiative of Fairer Future, sponsored by the Better Regulation Division of the New South Wales Department of Customer Service. Links will be developed with aged care homes, faith groups, service clubs such as Probus and government agencies

3. Description and purpose of Fairer Future

  • Fairer Future is a consumer protection “think tank” and advocacy body established by former senior officials of ACCC, the Treasury, academia, and civil society organisations. It has been operating since 2000. Fairer Future members believe that competitive markets deliver consumer welfare when consumers are properly informed and empowered to act in their own interests.
  • At the policy level, Fairer Future seeks to redress the imbalance in bargaining power between consumers and providers of goods and services. It has been active in NSW in engaging consumers to participate in energy regulation, at the national level on improving the Australian Consumer Law, campaigning on issues such as therapeutic goods regulation and improved regulation of financial services. Fairer Future has worked extensively throughout south-east Asia and the Pacific on issues such as governance, corruption prevention, consumer protection and competition law.
  • Fairer Future work plan 2023-2027
    • Working for the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Australian domestic and global policy making
    • Regulation of markets with better laws administered by vigorously independent and well-resourced agencies.
    • Seeking to equip consumer and competition agencies with sufficient powers to ensure high protection standards are applied to all sectors of the economy.
    • Empowering and advocacy for all consumers (especially the vulnerable and those currently without voices) in policy making.
    • Research and advocacy on making markets work fairly and sustainably.
    • Strengthening and defending Integrity institutions to provide a strong and independent fourth arm of government with the capacity to counteract corruption and ensure accountability of governments and those who deal with them.
    • FEMAG has worked in partnership with organisations such as Choice for better regulation of the therapeutic goods industry, it has participated in reviews of the Australian Consumer Law, prepared reports on consumer policy throughout ASEAN and sponsored programs for consumer protection and empowerment in the Solomon Islands.
    • Fairer Future was conceived on the principle that the best form of consumer protection is vigorous competition in fair and informed markets. Therefore, Fairer Future has sought to promote markets free from deception which enable consumers to maximise their welfare through making wise choices with the ability to acquire goods which meet their needs in competitive markets where there is redress when things go wrong. Since its formation, Fairer Future has achieved much on behalf of consumers and through its current program Fairer Future expects to continue such work into the future.

4. Project distinctives:

  • Engagement and consultation with seniors and their trusted representative groups to identify pathways for effective information, education, and harm prevention strategies.
  • A distinctive of CyberSaferSeniors will be the exploration of nudge techniques from the science of behavioural economics to design information and intervention initiatives which contribute to better cyber safety and generation of Cyber Safer champions.
  • A further distinctive of CyberSaferSeniors will be the use of the extensive Fair-Trading network of locations together with Services NSW. This is particularly important to reach regional seniors.
  • Key to the success of CyberSaferSeniors will be localised engagement with target groups in the development of information education and action programs.

5. Project elements

  • Negotiation – This project is a proof-of-concept pilot sponsored by Better Regulation Division of the New South Wales Department of Customer Service, first steps will be to optimise the project goals and methodology in such a way that it most fully meets the needs of the sponsor.
  • Research – an important second stage of the project will be to survey, consult and collect relevant resource materials. This will involve desk research on trends in cyber harm, gathering existing community resources to counteract it, interviews with Scamwatch (ACCC), the Cyber Safety Centre, NSW Fair Trading and Services NSW, representative organisations the seniors including senior’s computer clubs.
  • Engagement – a vital part of CyberSaferSeniors will be meaningful engagement, with cohorts of seniors selected to provide a diversity of locations and contexts (it is proposed to undertake engagement in the Central Coast, Wagga Wagga, Dubbo, and Newcastle areas).
  • Testing – as potential teaching aids and strategies derived from engagement are identified they will be tested by employing techniques from behavioural economics for sensitivity and suitability prior to rollout.
  • Implementation – subject groups of seniors with links to faith groups, service clubs and aged care institutions will be identified, and program materials applied.
  • Evaluation – the final phase of the project will be to evaluate and report on outcomes. This will include assessing the extent to which knowledge acquisition and commitment to action are expressed together with the preparedness of subject groups to become CyberSaferSeniors champions in their own context.
  • Sustainability – A key to the sustainability of the project will be availability of ongoing resources from NSW Fair Trading or services NSW provided through their networks.
  • Report – while it is expected that NSW Fair Trading will periodically participate and observe prior stages, a whole of project report together with assessments of project strengths and weaknesses and recommendations will be prepared.

6. How the project will protect consumers

  • Governments at both the Commonwealth and State level, community groups and financial service providers are all active in trying to counteract the growth of cyber harm. Most of their efforts are designed at attempting to halt or take down scammers or in the production of generalised warnings and information to whole populations.
  • CyberSaferSeniors is intended to take information, education, and promotion of self-help directly to seniors and by engaging and partnering with seniors and their representative organisations to build direct links through engagement to act as a preventative.
  • Current programs, though numerous, are failing to keep pace with the 33% increase in scans reported By Scam Watch since 2020. A core value of Fairer Future is that the best form of consumer protection is vigorous competition in fair and informed markets. Informed, alert and equipped consumers are in the strongest position to act in their own interests, and where they do, scarce government resources can be focused on the support of those who through vulnerability or other causes are not able to protect their own interests.
  • It is a widely accepted observation amongst consumer and community groups that individuals are far more likely to respond to coaching and advice on protecting themselves when it comes from trusted friends and organisations. A review of Commonwealth cyber harm programs found that while 63% of people discussed the incidence of cyber harm with friends and family, 68% did not report the scam to a government or law enforcement agency, underlining the value for direct engagement with seniors.
  • Governments working through such organisations to deliver programs are still essential but cut through is much higher when a trusted friend shows you how to secure your passwords.
7. Project phases
  • Inform, educate, and promote Essential to the success of CyberSaferSeniors is the need for thorough research of the incidence of cyber harm and range of agencies tools and resources designed to control it. Research alone however is inadequate, also needed is genuine engagement with both seniors and their trusted representatives and preliminary testing of the behavioural economics strategies that derive from research and engagement. Implementation of materials in urban and rural locations is required and for seniors’ groups in different circumstances such as the residential context, within service and support clubs and through affiliated groups. Finally, post implementation evaluation is an essential step which might lead to material revisions of approaches.
  • The explosive growth of cyber harm in NSW is particularly targeted to seniors. Despite large-scale mass information and enforcement activities, authorities have not been able to modify the behaviour of seniors in such a way that it might prevent or at least reduce the incidence of cyber harm.
  • CyberSaferSeniors is expressly about applying research-based findings through behavioural economics techniques to increase consumer awareness, promote positive self-protection for themselves and their friends through the application of modern adult learning techniques, innovative information provision and educational strategies.
  • The field of cyber harm is a rapidly growing one and the tools developed in the Safer Cyber Seniors project need to be living ones to adapt to rapidly changing risk environment.
By reaching into communities and directly engaging with seniors, interventions can be timely and targeted.
  • Engage and partner – The implementation of CyberSaferSeniors relies on support and participation of a range of community organisations. These might be seniors computer clubs, aged care homes, faith groups or other service clubs such as Probus. As the engagement phase of the project is undertaken with such organisations and, importantly, groups of seniors, there will be many opportunities for Better Regulation Division branding and involvement. Successful implementation of CyberSaferSeniors may be a pointer to similar future strategies for youth, indigenous communities, and other CALD consumers. As CyberSaferSeniors is an innovative approach to a known and increasing problem, it requires consultation with Better Regulation Division to agree on availability and extent of partnership and sponsorship activities in both urban and rural settings. This will include research and consultation with partner groups such as Service NSW and in particular the Seniors Card enterprise, ACCC and cyber enforcement agencies and civil society groups such as Choice, seniors computer clubs and groups with links into aged care settings.

8. Tangible outputs and outcomes

Outputs from the CyberSaferSeniors project will include up-to-date research materials, engagement notes and consumer protection strategies built on behavioural economic principles. Testing and implementation will provide further data and experience upon which NSW Fair Trading can build future strategies and a post implementation evaluation to guide analogous future project Improves and focuses on regional support/engagement.
With research, engagement, testing, implementation, and evaluation planned for several regional centres, CyberSaferSeniors will support the existing activities of NSW Fair Trading and other agencies in their nonurban work.

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