Australia Post is shutting down Digital iD, the first privately operated digital identity service to gain accreditation under Australia’s federal digital identity framework, citing growth in the number of government-issued digital credentials now available to consumers.
The service will cease operations at the end of this month. All user data, including stored photo IDs and Digital Keypass records, will be deleted on April 30. Keypass, the proof-of-age component of Digital iD, had already been discontinued in 2023.
Digital iD launched in 2017 and by 2019 had become the second service accredited under what was then called the Trusted Digital Identity Framework, after the federal government’s myGovID, now renamed myID. The app offered identity verification through selfie-based face biometrics and allowed users to access banking, postal, and age-verification services through a single credential.
Australia Post attributed the closure to the expansion of alternatives including mobile driver’s licenses deployed in New South Wales, Victoria, and Queensland, and the federal myID service. The technology underlying Digital iD will continue to be used for biometric identity verification within Australia Post’s own operations and for certain government service contracts.
The closure comes as private providers remain excluded from the Australian Government Digital Identity System until December 2026, a condition that was included to secure passage of the Digital ID Act in 2024. The Australian Taxation Office and Services Australia are currently the only accredited providers within the government system. Three private sector entities have applied for accreditation through the ACCC-administered register but have not yet gained entry: ConnectID, Makesure Consulting, and IDVerse.
Digital identity consultant Stephen Wilson described the outcome as a market failure, noting that similar private identity providers had failed in the United Kingdom over a five-year period. The structural barrier is the government’s decision to keep private providers out of the national system until the end of 2026, limiting the commercial pathways available for services like Digital iD to build a sustainable user base.
Australia’s communications regulator has separately proposed digital ID requirements for prepaid SIM verification, illustrating the government’s continued expansion of identity requirements even as the private market consolidates. Australia Post said the biometric technology built for Digital iD remains operational and will continue to serve internal verification purposes.
Sources: Digital iD, InnovationAus
–
By Cass Kennedy
