myID and ConnectID: two very different jobs on the same rails

First, a correction, because if I'm going to hold the government to its own words I have to hold myself to mine. Last week I said the system opens to private companies on 30 November. That date came from the Finance Minister's release of December last year. Her release of 26 June this year, and the Digital ID System's own policy page from the same day, both say 1 December 2026. One day later. The point stands, the date moves, and I've put a note on last week's post. From here on I'll say 1 December.

Now, the two names you're going to hear a lot more of. They sound alike, they're accredited under the same law, and they do two very different jobs.

myID is you proving yourself to the government. It's the government's own app, the one I wrote about last week. Its job is to get you into government services: myGov, Centrelink, the tax office, the business register, the NDIS portal, 264 of them at the last count, 155 Commonwealth and 109 state and territory. In the twelve months to the end of April this year it was used more than 113 million times to prove somebody was who they said they were. The year before that it was 36 and a half million. That's not a trend, that's a stampede.

Two things about it worth knowing. It's free for you and the government says it stays free: "individual users will continue to be able to create and use a myID for free." And your documents don't live in the app. The myID security page says only your core details are stored, your name, date of birth and email, and that when you verify a document or your face it's checked against government records and, for the face, "your photo is deleted" after the one-off check.

ConnectID is you proving yourself to a business, using your bank. This is the one your bank has been quietly building. It's run by Australian Payments Plus, the company behind a fair bit of the plumbing your money already moves through, and its own page calls it "Australia's first private-sector identity exchange accredited under the Digital ID Act."

Here's how it works, in their words and mine. You're signing up for a phone plan, or buying something online that needs to know your age. Instead of photographing your licence and sending it off, you see a button, "Verify with ConnectID". You pick your bank. You log in to your banking app the way you always do. The app shows you exactly what the business is asking for, and you say yes or no. Their example: buying alcohol online "may only require your name and confirmation that you're over 18"; a social media age check "may only need confirmation that you're over 16", without your name or your licence going anywhere. They say the exchange "never sees or stores your personal information"; it's "just the bridge". And your banking app keeps a log of where you've shared your details.

Who can use it today: customers of CommBank, NAB, ANZ Plus and Westpac. That's their list, on their page. ANZ Plus is ANZ's newer app; if you're still on the classic ANZ app, you're not on their list. If you bank with Heritage, a credit union or anyone else, you don't have it yet. Where it's already turned up: Telstra stores nationally since June, Snapchat's age checks since last November, and a list of smaller outfits, a car-sales platform, a couple of telcos.

Same rails. Both of them sit under the Digital ID Act 2024. Both are on the accredited entities register the ACCC keeps as Digital ID Regulator, and the government says accreditation means "strict rules and standards for privacy protection, security, usability, accessibility, risk management, fraud control and more." That register is public. If a "verify with" button ever carries a name you don't know, the register is where you check it. I've linked it below.

Different jobs, and from 1 December the jobs start to cross. Here's the bit from the June announcement, in plain words:

• From 1 December, a business can apply to use myID to verify its customers. A bank, a phone company, a real estate agent. And the government will charge the business for it, "from 1 January 2027 at the latest", a per-transaction fee still to be set after a public consultation. You don't pay. The business does.
• From the same day, an accredited private provider, and ConnectID is one, can apply to be used by "selected government services". Not all of them. The Minister's release says the higher-risk services, "where fraud could significantly affect people's financial circumstances", will not accept a private provider, and a list of those is to be published.
• Government services keep using the government's own system for free, and nobody is forced to offer you a choice of provider.

So the picture, for the person at the kitchen table: today, myID gets you into the government and your bank gets you into the bank. From December, your myID might get you into a phone plan, and your bank might get you into a government service that's decided to accept it. Whether that's a convenience or a muddle depends entirely on who's holding the key and what they're allowed to do with it, which is the question I said I'd keep asking.

What I like, and what I'm watching. I like the idea underneath both of them. Every photocopy of your licence sitting in a shop's filing cabinet is a licence waiting to be stolen, and "yes, he's over 18" is a better answer to give a bottle shop than your whole date of birth and your home address. If the bank already knows me, let the bank say so and keep the rest.

What I'm watching is the list of four banks, because out here plenty of us aren't with any of them. The consent screen, because it only works if people read it and "yes" is a decision, not a reflex. And the part nobody's written down yet: what happens at the counter in a town where the bank app won't load because the signal's dropped out. The rules say there has to be another way. I want to see that other way exist before the convenient one becomes the only one anyone offers.

Next Monday: the under-16 social media ban, and why it's the reason the platforms want all this. ConnectID's own page already talks about checking you're over 16 without sharing anything else.

What I'd do this week, and why. Not what you should do. What I'd do.

• If you bank with one of the four, open your banking app and look for ConnectID or "identity sharing" in the settings. Read what it says. Don't turn anything on today; just know where it is and what it claims.
• Next time a shop asks to photocopy your licence, ask whether they take a digital ID instead. The answer tells you how far along they are, and it reminds them that someone's noticed.
• Bookmark the ACCC's accredited register, linked below. Before you ever trust a "verify with" button, check the name is on it. That's a ten-second habit, and it's most of the protection you'll ever need.