This privacy notice has been translated into multiple languages.
This notice explains how we (the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care) manage your personal information, consistent with our obligations under the Privacy Act 1988 (Privacy Act), if you choose to register your interest for a COVID-19 vaccination using our online Register Your Interest platform.
Information we collect
We collect personal information about you that is entered using the Register your interest platform, including your:
- First and last name
- Age
- State or Territory
- Postcode
- Email address and/or mobile number (you can choose to enter one or both of these details as a way for us to contact you).
We will also record your responses to the questions in the Vaccine Eligibility Checker for the purposes of notifying when it’s the right time for you to make an appointment or receive the vaccine. Further information on how your personal information is handled under the Vaccine Eligibility Checker can be found at Healthdirect’s Privacy Policy.
At this stage of the COVID-19 Vaccine and Treatment Strategy, the Register Your Interest Platform is only available to people 18 years or over. If you submit information on behalf of some else, you must be their parent/ legal guardian or have their permission to do so.
Why we collect your personal information
We collect this information so that we are able to notify you when you are eligible to make an appointment to receive your COVID-19 vaccination or to notify you about the availability of a COVID-19 vaccine in your area. We will use the mobile number or email address that you have provided to contact you for these purposes. Where you have a provided an email address, that will be our preferred way of contacting you.
We will know when to contact you based on your responses to the eligibility criteria in the Vaccine Eligibility Checker. The Eligibility Checker tells us what phase of the COVID‑19 Vaccine Strategy you fall within. You must first use the Eligibility Checker before you can register your interest for a COVID‑19 vaccination.
Use and disclosure of your personal information
For notifications
We will only use your personal contact information to notify you of your eligibility to make an appointment to receive a COVID-19 vaccine or about the availability of a vaccine in your area. This may include situations where you are now eligible to make an appointment to receive a vaccine or where there are additional vaccines or vaccination services made available close to the postcode you have nominated.
We have assessed notification providers, who will contact you on our behalf, to ensure they have strong privacy and data security protections. We will share your details with them. They will be able to use your information for this purpose only.
We have previously used ‘Notify’, the Australian Government Digital Transformation Agency (DTA)’s notifications platform in order to contact you. Notify is an online notifications service that provides government entities the capability to send emails and text messages. We will manage when and how the messages are sent to you via Notify. As an Australian Government entity, the DTA must follow the Privacy Act. Their Privacy Statement for Notify can be found on their website. The DTA has also ensured strong data security protections are in place.
In the future, we may use Amazon Web Services (AWS) ‘Pinpoint’ notifications platform in order to contact you. ‘Pinpoint’ is an online notifications service that provides government entities the capability to send emails and text messages. We will manage when and how the messages are sent to you via ‘Pinpoint’. AWS has strict privacy and data security protections and the AWS Privacy Notice can be found on their website.
To send you a notification via either ‘Notify’ or ‘Pinpoint’, your data (including personal information) will first be transferred from the Register Your Interest platform to our Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW).The EDW is an established platform that supports the Department of Health and Aged Care’s storage of data in a secure environment within Australia. Access to identifiable information is restricted to departmental technical staff approved to undertake data cleaning (such as identifying duplicate entries) and preparation of files for notifications.
We use the EDW to load contact details to the notification platform in order to send messages via either email or SMS (text message).
If, in the future, we need to contract another Notification provider, we will ensure that we engage a Notification provider with equally strong privacy and data security protections who will contact you on our behalf. We will share your details with them. They will be able to use your information for this purpose only.
For monitoring and reporting
We will use data in the EDW to generate de-identified aggregate reports to support our monitoring of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout. Your State or Territory will have access to these reports to enable them to monitor levels of demand against available stock for the COVID-19 vaccine in your area. We may also include your data in our Vaccine Data Solution (Data Solution) for this purpose. The Data Solution is a software solution for monitoring coverage and logistics for COVID‑19 vaccines. It will produce reports containing de‑identified information about the vaccine rollout.
Your details will not be disclosed to your vaccine provider from the Register Your Interest Platform. To understand how we collect and handle your personal information when you receive a COVID-19 vaccination, please see our Privacy Notice for COVID-19 Vaccines.
Opting out of notifications
If you change your mind once you receive a notification from us, you are able to opt-out of further messages.
You will need to reply to your email or SMS (text message) to opt-out. We will ensure this is reflected in our data store on the EDW. We will retain your information in the EDW but will not contact you again.
How your information is stored
When you register your interest, your data will be stored in secure cloud services provided by AWS. The Vaccine Data Solution also uses these services. Our partner who manages those cloud services must meet our requirements for privacy and data security. This includes complying with the Privacy Act and protecting data from misuse, loss, corruption and unauthorised access or disclosure.
Our ICT service providers responsible for managing and operating the Register Your Interest Platform may also have access to your details for system maintenance and upgrade purposes, but they must meet our strict requirements for privacy, confidentiality and security.
Information held in our EDW is managed under our strict privacy and security protocols. We will retain this information as required by legislation.
Storage in Notify
If we send you a message via Notify, your personal information, including your mobile number and email address, will be temporarily held in the Notify platform for up to 7 days in case of any technical issues that need to be resolved. After 7 days, your information is automatically deleted from Notify.
Metadata will be retained by telecommunications providers in accordance with the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979.
Storage in Pinpoint
If we send you a message via ’Pinpoint’, your personal information, including your mobile number and email address, will be held in the ‘Pinpoint’ platform in the Department of Health and Aged Care’s account. We will delete this information after 7 days once we have ensured either there are no technical issues to be resolved. or
Metadata will be retained by telecommunications providers in accordance with the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979.
Website analytics
When you use our Register Your Interest platform, we use cookies (small files stored on your device) created both by us and third parties. Cookies allow us to recognise an individual web user as they browse our website. The cookie identifies your browser or device, not you personally. No personal information is stored within cookies used by our website. The information collected includes:
- your server and IP address;
- the name of the top level domain (for example, .gov, .com, .edu, .au);
- the type of browser used;
- the date and time you accessed the website;
- how you interacted with our website; and
- the previous website you visited.
We use the above information to understand how our websites are being used. This helps us improve our websites and provide you with a better experience. The information generated by the cookie may be transmitted to and stored by Google, who may use this information for the purpose of compiling reports on website activity for us (or advertising agencies engaged to act on our behalf). Demographic and interest reports may be generated including characteristics such as your age, gender and location. These reports do not identify you personally.
You can find out more about how we use cookies on our website privacy policy.
How you can access or correct your information
At present, if you enter the wrong details into the Register Your Interest Platform, or if your details change after you have entered them, you can register your interest again using the correct details. You will be notified for every entry you make in the Register Your Interest Platform. Therefore it will be important for you to check that the notification you receive to make an appointment is the notification based on the correct entry details.
If incorrect details are entered into the Register Your Interest Platform, we are not currently able to stop you from receiving a notification based on the incorrect details. We will update this Privacy Notice if that policy changes.
Concerns and complaints
Our privacy policy explains how you can make a complaint if you think we have breached:
- the Australian Privacy Principles; or
- the Australian Government Agencies Privacy Code.
The privacy policy also explains how we will manage your complaint.
More on privacy
We have taken steps to ensure that the implementation of the the COVID-19 Vaccine and Treatment Strategy is compliant with the Privacy Act 1988 and any other legislation that is relevant to the rollout.
Read more about privacy matters relating to the COVID‑19 vaccine rollout on our COVID-19 Privacy Page.
For general privacy matters, see our privacy page and our full privacy policy.