The rollout of the Accenture-built government security vetting system continues to face complications, as the agency in charge fails to meet its KPI on baseline clearances.
Technical issues with the platform were expected to be resolved by the end of February, with a project implementation review to be initiated after, as reported by InnovationAus.com.
But the remediation taskforce – including two additional SES level staff and 50 APS staff – which is focused on fixing data quality problems, manually processing clearances, and rolling out progressive technical fixes with Accenture remains active.
Given the delays in fully resolving the technical issues, a review of the rollout is now only in the planning stage.
As of April 14, more than 8,500 baseline clearances had been processed through myClearance. With a median processing time of 33 business days, the applications processed through the platform to date miss the Australian Government Security Vetting Agency’s (AGSVA) key performance indicator: a median of 20 business days or less.
Department of Defence deputy secretary, security and estate, Celia Perkins told Senate Estimates in mid-February that “in the transition to myClearance, the baseline level, which is around 50 per cent of the clearances produced every year… is working”.
Ms Perkins also said technical issues with myClearance were expected to be resolved by the end of the month before a project implementation review was undertaken.
She said that issues with the “increased security multifactor authentication” had prevented some users from logging in, but that this issue had been resolved.
However, The Office of National Intelligence (ONI) separately told Senate Estimates that it was “unable to readily access the information held on the myClearance system owing to login and multifactor authentication issues and ONI’s requirement for its staff to operate in a secure facility”.
While ONI uses a different vetting system for its staff, in some cases it requires clearance information from AGSVA. Owing to difficulties in accessing myClearance, ONI enquires manually through phone calls, which take around five minutes, or via email which returns responses “from same-day to five days on average”.
A Defence spokesperson previously told InnovationAus.com in mid-January that myClearance processing issues have centred on more complex higher-level clearances.
To help prioritise remediation efforts, revalidation and annual appraisal dates have been postponed by up to half a year in some cases, with processing on these expected to re-commence “in a staged approach” this month. It was initially expected to recommence in mid-January.
Assistant Defence minister Matt Thistlethwaite told InnovationAus.com that “technical issues with myClearance are now largely resolved”.
“The Albanese government is closely monitoring work by Defence to finalise delayed security clearances as soon as possible and the taskforce remains active,” he said.
According to the AGSVA website, ongoing clearance applications also had their deadlines extended to mid-April, after being extended at least twice since the launch of myClearance to mid-February and then to mid-March.
Mr Thistlethwaite noted that more cases are being processed per week through myClearance than under the previous system. As of mid-April, 13,500 clearances had been processed through myClearance with 7,500 clearances processed in the last two months.
Overall, 31 per cent of all clearances (43,344 cases) completed in financial year 2022-23 have been processed through myClearance, as of mid-April.
Defence told ABC News in March that there had been no unplanned outages of the MyClearance system, but that “users may have experienced some challenges due to broader Defence and whole-of-government ICT service availability”.
Accenture initially received a $114 million contract to work on the vetting transformation project from February 2021 to the end of July 2025. Following four amendments, the contract value has grown by $15.5 million.
An Australian National Audit Office report in 2018 found that “AGSVA’s security vetting services do not effectively mitigate the government’s exposure to insider threats”.
First pass approval for an end-to-end fully digital and automated system was granted in April 2018 before receiving second pass approval December 2020, in the same month a second vetting audit was released.
