Premier Daniel Andrews has set up an agency to monitor Victorians

Explosive documents reveal Daniel Andrews has set up a “deeply disturbing” Big Brother-style data agency to monitor how we think, feel and spend.

Daniel Andrews has established a Big Brother-style data agency to monitor the activities of everyday Victorians. Picture: Brendan Beckett

Premier Daniel Andrews has established a Big Brother-style data agency to monitor the activities of everyday Victorians.

Called Insights Victoria, it reports to Mr Andrews’ secretive private office as the “single source of truth” for public servants, monitoring everything from social media sentiment to credit card transactions.

The agency received $4.4m in the recent state budget and documents obtained by the Sunday Herald Sun reveal that while it was set up as part of the government’s Covid response in August 2020, it will continue to provide information to senior public servants and the premier’s personal staff.

The sensitive information, including how people spend their money, their levels of housing stress, health and mental health, is being curated in real time and updated every morning.

Documents released under Freedom of Information reveal that while the real time dashboard uses publicly available data it also included “commercial in-confidence” and “sensitive” data not permitted for third party or public release.

Internal government documents from the launch of Insights Victoria obtained by the Sunday Herald Sun under freedom of information. Picture: Supplied

Access to all data has been granted to Chief Commissioner Shane Patton, chief health officer Brett Sutton, emergency management commissioner Andrew Crisp and Mr Andrews’s private political staff.

According to a September 2020 briefing note, while ministerial private offices and senior public servants have some access to the system on a need-to-know basis, Mr Andrews’s private office of political staff has unlimited access to the data.

People granted access to the system are able to download and export the data from any map or chart it produces by clicking on a button.

The September note, prepared by the government’s Mission Facilitation Office, said the system would include a “behaviour and sentiments” section that covered “social media sentiments and behaviour and attitude surveys”, originally in relation to Covid restrictions.

However, it foreshadowed that the system could continue as an “enduring platform” that would “evolve to support cross-portfolio decision making beyond Covid-19”.

“Insights Victoria is designed to meet the short term Covid data needs but also be a long-term platform for providing real-time whole of Victorian Government data, analytics and insights,” the document read.

“Insights Victoria can reduce the time and effort required to quickly understand the ‘state of the state’ across all portfolios.”

‘Consumer transaction data’ is among the information collected by Insights Victoria. Supplied

A guide to the system, attached to the briefing, stated it included “consumer transaction data”.

Opposition Treasury spokesman David Davis said the revelation that the premier’s political staff has access to this level of information was deeply disturbing and showed he was prepared to use the deep and personal data sources for political ends.

“In the new Insights Victoria with his intrusive and powerful deep dive IT system, monitoring Victorians every digital move, cross tabulating their personal information, Andrews has more power than Big Brother,” Mr Davis said. “This really feels like a Brave New World.

“It truly does have the feel of a dystopian society where one man and his office have overweening power buttressed by access to unprecedented streams of personal information.”

Mr Davis said few Victorians would believe protections were in place to ensure the system was not misused.

“After all, they are only learning about this extraordinary data base and Daniel Andrews’ personal control of it after a massive FOI fight,’ he said.

“These are facts and information Daniel Andrews would rather have kept secret.”

Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio on Sunday defended the state government’s use of anonymised data, saying all governments purchase its citizens’ data to stay informed.

“Let’s be clear about this, all governments utilise anonymised data to inform their decisions, to inform their programs, to make sure that the best decisions are made in terms of government operations,” Ms D’Ambrosio.

“The government purchases anonymised information, anonymised data. It is already anonymised at the point of purchase.

The Premier’s private office of political staff has unlimited access to the data. Picture: Supplied

“And governments all do that. And it’s about making sure that the collection of information is utilised so that governments make the best decisions, whether it’s rolling out programs, whether it’s for Covid response, whether it’s for transportation matters.”

The Minister, speaking on behalf of the state government on Sunday, refused to be drawn on whether it needed the “consumer transaction data” of Victorians.

“Again, this is anonymised information. No Victorian should feel that their personal information is exposed in any way. It isn’t,” she said.

“It’s about informing government on a whole range of programs and initiatives that are about governments making right choices and the right investment decisions for Victorians.

“There’s nothing more to it than that.”

It comes after a government spokesman said Insights Victoria “purchases anonymised data sets off private sector partners to provide insights to government”.

“The data provided is not market sensitive and is anonymised,” the spokesman said.

The use of anonymised data purchased from financial institutions is understood to have been used until late 2021 to help understand physical movement across the state at a local government area level.

The revelation that Labor staff are being given access to sensitive information comes as the Andrews’ Government fights to keep secret taxpayer-funded research into Victorians’ attitude to the pandemic.

Last month Victoria’s information commissioner, Sven Bluemmel, ordered the Department of Premier and Cabinet to release in full documents related to surveys of Victorians by the Premier’s $2m political strategist, QDOS Research.

Originally published as Premier Daniel Andrews has set up an agency to monitor Victorians