Based on the conference theme of Back to the Future, I’d like to take a 20 year retrospective view of how Australia has tackled cybercrime, what has worked and what hasn’t.

The Cybercrime Act 2001 has been around for over two decades and was the first in an extensive suite of cybercrime related legislation, including Acts which address metadata, data breaches and critical infrastructure.  Along the way there has been a number of government agencies created, disbanded and modified. Organisations of all shapes and sizes are now taking cyber security more seriously and there is a steady increase of cyber security professionals and companies.  Combined with a now intense media scrutiny of cyber attacks, as a jurisdiction we have come a long way.

But in reality, has any of these made any difference?  Statistics would tell us they haven’t.

This presentation will analyse these factors and determine if any of the new measures being introduced are actually new, or have been tried in the past and were either unsuccessful or disbanded due to lack of interest.

This presentation will rely on a wide range of Freedom of Information requests, surveys of industry professionals and previous academic research to give a factual base for the hypotheses that in reality, we have not achieved a great deal in combatting cybercrime.

It will be an entertaining, yet thought provoking presentation looking back to the future.