Data about corporations

ORIC corporation data sharing policy

The Registrar of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’s (the Registrar) functions are set out in section 658-1 of the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Act 2006 (CATSI Act), and includes: 

  • maintaining a Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations
  • making available to the public information about the registration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations and the administration of the CATSI Act. 

The Registrar’s policy is to make key registration, administration and regulatory information available on a public register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander corporations (public register) to provide:

  • a corporation’s members and stakeholders with transparency and accountability on the affairs of the corporation
  • certainty for corporation members, officers and employees in their dealing with the corporation
  • factual information that is in the public interest presented in a manner that is independent and impartial.

In maintaining a Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations, the Registrar is, from time to time, requested to provide data.

The Registrar balances the interest in corporation data with the knowledge that corporations provide data for a specific purpose and not necessarily with the expectation that it will be used for other purposes. To this end, the Registrar makes information available on data.gov.au, maintains the public register and has memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with other government agencies to facilitate the Registrar’s statutory functions. Outside of these arrangements, the Registrar does not generally support other data requests.

Sector data

The Registrar recognises the broader public interest in corporations registered under the CATSI Act - more generally as a sector. As such the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations (ORIC), along with other Australian Government agencies, makes data which is available on the public register, available on data.gov.au. 

This is the primary avenue for ORIC to provide public data that can be consolidated and extracted in a manner beyond individual corporations. Data published on data.gov.au is updated monthly.

ORIC will from time to time publish sector data snapshots that are of interest to the sector, Indigenous community and general public. Such reports will draw on data that is publicly available and presented in a manner that upholds the Registrar’s independence and impartiality.

Data for statutory purposes

ORIC exchanges data with other Australian Government agencies in limited circumstances, including where it has an MOU. MOUs and subsequent data exchange agreements are entered into only to facilitate the Registrar’s functions under the CATSI Act.

Requests for data

It is not ORIC’s practice to provide data services to external parties, reflecting the Registrar’s:

  • prioritisation of ORIC resources to activities that go directly to the support and regulation of Indigenous corporations
  • need to ensure that the use of ORIC data is not presented in a manner that compromises its independence and impartiality or erodes corporations’ trust and confidence in ORIC. 

We encourage interested parties to use the existing data we publish, which is regularly reviewed and updated.

While ORIC will consider requests for data on a case-by-case basis ORIC’s policy is to not provide data outside of the data that is already in the public domain.

Requests for data can be submitted by sending an email to info@oric.gov.au or by submitting an enquiry via myCorp. Requests need to outline the:

  • name, associated entity and role of the individual making the request
  • data being requested
  • timeframe for which the data is requested
  • purpose of the data request, including any planned analysis
  • intended use and disclosure of the data and any related analysis. 

Individual corporation data

The Registrar’s priority is ensuring information on individual corporations is made readily accessible to their members and stakeholders. The manner in which the public register is presented and its user functions reflects this priority.

Public register

Information included on the public register is a subset of the documents listed under Schedule 2 of the Corporations (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Regulations 2017 (CATSI Regulations). Schedule 2 sets out the documents and information to be included in the Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations. 

Not all of the information listed in Schedule 2 is available on the public register.

Subsection 421-1(1)(a) allows a person to inspect a document lodged with the Registrar. Inspections are not available for an exempt document as set out in subsection 421-1(4) of the CATSI Act or those documents exempt from inspection set out in Schedule 3 of the CATSI Regulations. 

To search all documents and information available for inspection, you can contact ORIC and we will provide you with an extract of documents for a specific corporation. 

ORIC does not have a data export function on the public register for privacy and other reasons. Further, people seeking an extract for a corporation from the public register are required to answer a question. This test is a security control used to deter cyber attacks. 

Registered Native Title Body Corporate data 

Our data visualisation about RNTBCs is not currently available while upgrades to our IT system continue. We hope to publish it again soon. In the meantime try checking our dataset on data.gov.au, or search the Register of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations for information about RNTBCs.

Complaints involving corporations

We produce regular statistical reports about complaints involving corporations. 

This helps us to:

  • monitor aspects of corporation performance over time
  • learn more about issues in the sector
  • do ongoing and yearly risk analysis to inform regulatory and support activities, for example, by geography, operating sector, size, frequency or recurring issues.

Corporations with reports not lodged

If a corporation fails to provide its report in time, we publish its name and state on the list of corporations with reports not lodged.

Open data and responsible sharing

We acknowledge the Australian Government’s Data and Digital Government Strategy, which promotes making non-sensitive data 'open by default' – freely available for anyone to use, reuse, and redistribute. However, we balance this commitment with our statutory responsibilities under the CATSI Act and the Privacy Act 1988. These laws require us to protect personal and culturally sensitive information, ensuring that data sharing is lawful, respectful, and in the public interest. We apply robust governance and privacy safeguards to ensure that openness does not compromise individual rights or community trust.

Content last updated: