Driver’s licences will soon be available on smartphones

Digital licences will take over existing card licences from next year, with recreational fishing licences, responsible service of alcohol (RSA) licences, and responsible conduct of gambling (RCG) licences to be changed over first.

“This technology will allow our citizens to display, apply, update and renew their licences using their smartphone, with real time information also available”, Perrottet said at a conference on government innovation on Wednesday. Fraud exists no matter if the licence is plastic or digital.

Other simple issues to be addressed include problems with flat batteries when needing to show your licence to authorities, and how you’ll be able to easily show proof of age for buying alcohol, or entering clubs and pubs.

NSW issues 23 million licences a year with 770 different types in circulation. Summing it up, Minister Perrottet said, “In 2015 our citizens are mobile and digital and that’s where the government should be too”.

Our licence is one of the most important cards in our wallets, but soon you mightn’t have one. “No wonder so many people dread getting a new licence”.

The digital licences will have security safeguards in place to protect them from online threats, although exactly what those safeguards will be has not yet been revealed.

“Customers are doing more and more transactions on their smartphones”, Perrottet said. The Department of Immigration and Border Protection also faced a breach of confidential records previous year when the personal details of 10,000 asylum seekers were mistakenly published on the Department’s website.

It’s a fulfilment of a 2015 election promise which will spell the start of the end of physical licences, as first reported by Fairfax. And physical licences will still be available for anyone prone to online paranoia.