Communications minister Mitch Fifield has revealed how telcos can apply for part of the $128.4 million grant set aside for data implementation costs.
The Australian parliament voted in favour of laws requiring telcos to store the metadata of Australian customers for two years in March last year.
The government announced in May that it would establish the $131 million fund to compensate telcos for the cost of retaining customers’ data. CRN understands the $3 million difference will be used to cover administration costs of the three-year scheme.
Laws came into effect in October, despite the majority of providers still upgrading their infrastructure to store metadata.
Australia’s three biggest telcos, Telstra, Optus and Vodafone, all the missed the deadline and applied for applications to extend their exemption.
Telcos will be scored out of 100 for eligibility for the grants, based on number of services offered, number of subscribers on their books, annual revenue and anticipated extra data storage needed to meet data retention obligations.
However, smaller telcos will be given an advantage when applying for the grant. Providers with an annual turnover of less than $3 million will automatically earn the first 25 points, handed out on a sliding scale according to size.
Analysis of the pitches will be shown to the implementation working group comprised of senior government stakeholders, senior executives from Telstra and Optus and chief executive of the Communications Alliance.
Applications are open until 23 February, with the full process expected to take three years.
Successful applications will receive half of their grants up front and the other half after their reporting obligations are met.
According to the scheme guideline, telcos will only have one opportunity to pitch their case for funding and will not be able to appeal the government’s decision if knocked back.
“Funding decisions are final and there is no opportunity for review of decision,” states the guideline.
“Note that funding allocations will not be linked to actual cost but to typical implementation cost, and do not reimburse full costs but are a financial contribution to the typical up-front costs of compliance.”
Members of the telecommunications industry have described the fund as grossly inadequate, including iiNet, which estimated its cost of storage infrasctructure to reach up to $100 million.
The government’s own advisors estimated the cost of implementing mandatory data retention could reach as much as $319.1 million, less than half of what the government has allocated.
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