Acknowledgement of Country

Our acknowledgement

Whitesec AU acknowledges the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the first peoples of this nation and the Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live and work.

Our Perth office is on Whadjuk Noongar Boodja. We recognise the Whadjuk Noongar people's continuing connection to land, waters and community. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present.

We work with clients across Australia and acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of every Country our work reaches.

As a security and governance firm, we respect the right of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to govern data about their communities, cultures and lands.

Sovereignty was never ceded. This always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land.

1. Why we publish this

An acknowledgement is only worth publishing if it changes how we work. This page explains what ours means for a cybersecurity and compliance firm, so that it is a statement you can hold us to and not only a courtesy.

2. Whadjuk Noongar Boodja

Whitesec AU is based in West Perth. The Whadjuk people are one of the Noongar groups of the south-west of Western Australia, and have cared for this Country for tens of thousands of years. The Noongar people's knowledge, law and connection to Country did not end with colonisation. It continues today.

We acknowledge that the city, the infrastructure and the digital networks we work on sit on land that was never ceded.

3. Across Country

Our clients operate in every state and territory, and much of our work is remote. The systems we assess, the networks we test and the data we protect all sit on someone's Country. We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of each of those places, and the Elders who carry the responsibility for them.

4. Indigenous Data Sovereignty

Security work puts us close to sensitive information. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, data about people, culture, language, sites and land is not a neutral asset. It carries collective rights and responsibilities.

We recognise the principles of Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Indigenous Data Governance, including:

• The right of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to own, control, access and possess data that is about them, their communities, their cultures and their lands.
• The principles set out by the Maiam nayri Wingara Indigenous Data Sovereignty Collective and the Australian Indigenous Governance Institute.
• The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance: Collective Benefit, Authority to Control, Responsibility and Ethics.
• The Australian Government's Framework for Governance of Indigenous Data, which applies to the Commonwealth and is a useful reference for the organisations we advise.

5. How this shapes our work

These commitments apply to engagements where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander data, communities or organisations are involved.

• Data is held for a purpose. We handle client data only for the engagement it was provided for, and we do not reuse it elsewhere.
• Authority sits with the community. Where a client holds data that belongs to or is about a community, we advise on controls that keep decisions about that data with the people it concerns, not only with the system administrator.
• Sensitive information is handled with care. Cultural information, sacred or restricted material, and records about sites or Country call for stricter access control, storage and retention than ordinary business data. We say so in our advice and build it into the controls we recommend.
• Storage and access are assessed, not assumed. In vendor and supply-chain reviews we ask where such data is hosted, who can reach it, and whether the community can see and correct how it is used.
• Breaches are treated as more than a compliance event. An incident involving this kind of data can harm a community as well as an individual. We encourage clients to notify and consult the affected community, in addition to meeting their statutory duties under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth).

6. Our ongoing responsibility

An acknowledgement is not the end of the work. We will keep learning, keep this page under review, and correct it where we get something wrong. We welcome guidance from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, organisations and Elders on how we can do better.

7. Feedback

If you would like to raise a concern, offer guidance, or ask how this acknowledgement applies to a particular engagement, contact Whitesec AU at support@whitesec.au or +61 413 211 278. A person will respond.