The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) will acquire visa data from the Department of Home Affairs for 2020-21 through to 2022-23.  The data items include:

■          Address history for visa applicants and sponsors.

■          Contact history for visa applicants and sponsors.

■          All visa grants.

■          Visa grant status by point in time.

■          Migration agents (visa application preparer who assisted or facilitated the processing of the visa).

■          Address history for migration agents.

■          Contact history for migration agents.

■          All international travel movements undertaken by visa holders (arrivals and departures).

■          Sponsor details

■          Education providers (educational institution where a student visa holder intends to undertake their study).

■          Visa subclass name.

We estimate records relating to approximately 10 million individuals will be obtained each financial year.

The data will be acquired and matched with ATO data holdings to identify non-compliance with obligations under taxation and superannuation laws.

These obligations may include registration, lodgment, reporting and payment responsibilities.

The objectives of this program are to:

■          promote voluntary compliance by communicating how we use external data to help encourage taxpayers to comply with their tax and superannuation obligations.

■          continue to refine our understanding of the visa population tax and superannuation risks across:

–           visa holders

–           visa sponsors

–           migration agents.

■          develop and implement treatment strategies to improve voluntary compliance; which may include educational or compliance activities as appropriate.

■          help ensure visa populations fulfil their registration, lodgment, correct reporting and payment of tax and superannuation obligations.

■          test the accuracy and strengths of our existing risk detection models and treatment systems, and identify areas for improvement in our models, treatment systems and practices.

■          identify potentially new or emergent approaches to fraud and those entities controlling or exploiting the visa framework.

■          improve the integrity of the taxation and superannuation systems by cancelling ineligible ABN holders.

■          support compliance activities under Australia's foreign investment rules.

■          identify and educate those individuals and businesses who may be failing to meet their registration and/or lodgment obligations and assist them to comply.

A document describing this program is available at ato.gov.au/dmprotocols.

This program follows the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner’s Guidelines on data matching in Australian Government administration (2014) (the guidelines). The guidelines include standards for the use data-matching as an administrative tool in a way that complies with the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) and the Privacy Act 1988 (Privacy Act) and are consistent with good privacy practice.

A full copy of the ATO’s privacy policy can be accessed at ato.gov.au/privacy.