IT Governance and Compliance: What Australian Business Owners Need to Know in 2025

What Is IT Governance?

IT governance is the framework of policies, processes, and responsibilities that ensure technology investments support business goals while managing risk appropriately. It provides structure around critical questions: Who makes technology decisions and how? How do we identify and manage IT risks? Are we compliant with relevant regulations? How do we measure IT performance and value? Effective IT governance connects technology strategy to business strategy, ensuring IT investments deliver measurable outcomes rather than operating as a disconnected cost centre.

Why IT Governance Matters for Australian SMBs

Without governance, IT becomes reactive and chaotic. Shadow IT proliferates as employees sign up for cloud services without approval. Security gaps appear because nobody owns risk management. Compliance failures occur because requirements are not tracked. Technology investments fail to deliver value because they are not aligned with business priorities. Good governance does not mean bureaucracy—it means clarity about who decides, what the rules are, and how we measure success.

Key Australian Regulatory Requirements in 2025

Australian businesses face a complex regulatory landscape that continues to evolve. Understanding your obligations is the foundation of IT compliance:

Privacy Act 1988 and Australian Privacy Principles

The Privacy Act governs how organisations collect, store, use, and disclose personal information. It applies to Australian Government agencies and private sector organisations with annual turnover exceeding $3 million, plus some smaller businesses handling health information, trading in personal data, or operating in specific sectors. The 13 Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) establish requirements for transparency, data quality, security, access rights, and cross-border disclosure. Recent amendments introduce new obligations around automated decision-making that take effect in December 2026.

Notifiable Data Breaches Scheme

Part IIIC of the Privacy Act requires covered entities to notify affected individuals and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) when a data breach is likely to result in serious harm. Notification must occur within 30 days of becoming aware of a qualifying breach. This requires your organisation to have breach detection capabilities, assessment processes, and response procedures documented and tested. The OAIC publishes statistics showing common breach causes—human error, credential compromise, and ransomware—which should inform your preventive controls.

Privacy Act Penalty Increases

Following the Optus and Medibank breaches, the Australian Government significantly increased Privacy Act penalties in late 2022. For serious or repeated privacy breaches, penalties now reach the greater of: $50 million, three times the benefit obtained from the breach, or 30% of adjusted turnover. These are among the largest privacy penalties globally and apply to businesses of all sizes covered by the Act.

Industry-Specific Regulations

Beyond the Privacy Act, various industries face additional IT governance requirements:

• Healthcare: My Health Records Act controls access to the national health record system. RACGP standards mandate security controls for general practices. State health privacy legislation may impose additional requirements.
• Financial services: APRA Prudential Standard CPS 234 requires APRA-regulated entities to maintain information security capability. ASIC has regulatory guidance on cyber resilience. AML/CTF obligations require specific data retention and monitoring.
• Legal: Australian Solicitors' Conduct Rules impose confidentiality obligations. State law societies have specific guidance on technology and cybersecurity. Legal professional privilege requires specific data handling procedures.
• Government contractors: The Protective Security Policy Framework (PSPF) applies to entities handling government information. The Essential Eight maturity model is often contractually required.
• Not-for-profits: Charities collecting donor data may voluntarily opt into Privacy Act coverage to demonstrate good practice.

The ACSC Essential Eight Framework

The Australian Cyber Security Centre Essential Eight is the primary cybersecurity framework for Australian organisations. Originally designed for government but now widely adopted in the private sector, it provides prioritised mitigation strategies against common attack vectors. The eight strategies address application control, patching, macro security, user application hardening, administrative privileges, multi-factor authentication, backups, and operating system patching. Many government contracts now require specific Essential Eight maturity levels, and cyber insurers increasingly reference it when assessing risk.

Essential Eight Maturity Levels

The framework defines four maturity levels (0-3) for each mitigation strategy. Level 0 indicates the control is not implemented or fundamentally inadequate. Level 1 represents partial implementation providing some protection against opportunistic attacks. Level 2 indicates more comprehensive implementation protecting against more sophisticated adversaries. Level 3 represents full implementation defending against advanced persistent threats. Most Australian SMBs should aim for Level 2 across all strategies, with Level 3 for organisations handling sensitive data or facing elevated threats.

Building an IT Governance Framework

Effective IT governance does not require complex bureaucracy—it requires clarity. For SMBs, focus on these foundational elements:

1. Define roles and accountability: Who owns IT decisions at strategic, tactical, and operational levels? Who is accountable for security? Who approves significant changes or new systems? Document these clearly even if the same person fills multiple roles.
2. Create proportionate policies: Document acceptable use, security, data handling, BYOD, and change management policies. Keep them concise and enforceable—long policies that nobody reads provide no protection.
3. Implement risk management: Identify IT assets and their criticality. Assess threats and vulnerabilities. Implement controls proportionate to risk. Review regularly as your environment changes.
4. Establish change control: Formal processes for evaluating and approving changes to systems. For SMBs, this can be simple—document who approves changes, require testing before production deployment, and maintain rollback procedures.
5. Monitor and measure: Define key performance indicators for IT service delivery, security posture, and project success. Track incidents and near-misses. Conduct periodic reviews of IT performance.
6. Maintain compliance evidence: Map regulatory requirements to controls. Document how you meet each requirement. Maintain evidence of control operation (logs, attestations, audit reports). This prepares you for audits and demonstrates due diligence.
7. Establish vendor management: Document how you assess and monitor third-party IT suppliers. Ensure contracts include appropriate security and privacy requirements. Conduct periodic reviews of vendor performance and risk.

Essential IT Policies for Australian SMBs

Start with these core policies and expand as your organisation matures. Each policy should be reviewed annually and communicated to all relevant staff:

• Acceptable Use Policy: Define what employees can and cannot do with company technology, including personal use, social media, cloud services, and AI tools. Address consequences for violations.
• Information Security Policy: Establish how data and systems are protected, referencing the Essential Eight or your chosen framework. Define security responsibilities for all staff.
• Privacy and Data Handling Policy: Detail how personal information is collected, stored, used, disclosed, and destroyed in accordance with the APPs. Include procedures for data subject access requests.
• Data Classification Policy: Define categories (public, internal, confidential, restricted) and handling requirements for each. This enables proportionate protection of your most sensitive information.
• Access Control Policy: Document who approves access, how access is provisioned and revoked, password requirements, and MFA expectations. Reference the principle of least privilege.
• Incident Response Policy: Define what constitutes a security incident, who to notify, investigation procedures, and reporting requirements including NDB obligations.
• Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Policy: Document how you will maintain operations during disruptions, backup procedures, recovery time objectives, and testing requirements.
• Remote Work Security Policy: Address security requirements for working outside the office including device security, network access, and data handling.
• Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) Policy: If you permit personal devices, define security requirements, separation of personal and business data, and rights to wipe business data.

IT Governance with a Managed Service Provider

Many Australian SMBs lack internal resources to implement comprehensive IT governance. A managed IT provider can help by providing policy templates adapted to your business, implementing technical controls aligned with frameworks like Essential Eight, monitoring compliance and security posture, managing vendor relationships and licensing, preparing for audits and assessments, and responding to incidents according to documented procedures. When selecting an MSP, evaluate their own governance maturity—ask about their security certifications, insurance, and how they meet regulatory requirements.

Governance for Microsoft 365 Environments

Microsoft 365 includes governance and compliance tools that support regulatory requirements. Microsoft Purview provides data classification, retention policies, eDiscovery, and audit logging. Azure AD (now Entra ID) provides identity governance including access reviews, privileged identity management, and conditional access policies. Security and Compliance Centre dashboards show your compliance posture against common frameworks. However, these tools require configuration—out-of-the-box Microsoft 365 does not meet most regulatory requirements without tuning.

Common IT Governance Mistakes

• Treating governance as a one-time project: Governance requires ongoing attention. Policies must be reviewed, controls tested, and frameworks updated as your business changes.
• Creating policies nobody reads: Long, complex policies written in legal language do not change behaviour. Keep policies concise and train staff on expectations.
• Confusing compliance with security: Compliance demonstrates you met minimum requirements at a point in time. Security is an ongoing practice. Being compliant does not mean being secure.
• Ignoring third-party risk: Your vendors and cloud services are part of your governance scope. Their breaches can become your breaches.
• No evidence of control operation: Saying you have a control is not enough. Maintain logs, attestations, and audit evidence that controls actually operate.

Getting Started: IT Governance Roadmap

For SMBs starting their governance journey, prioritise these actions:

1. Week 1-2: Identify which regulations apply to your business. Document personal information you collect and store. Review current security controls.
2. Week 3-4: Create or update core policies (acceptable use, information security, incident response). Assign accountability for IT governance.
3. Month 2: Assess your Essential Eight maturity. Implement quick wins like MFA and backup verification. Document your IT asset inventory.
4. Month 3: Develop risk register and treatment plan. Create compliance mapping for applicable regulations. Establish regular review cadence.
5. Ongoing: Conduct quarterly policy reviews. Test incident response annually. Monitor for regulatory changes. Report governance metrics to leadership.