NTLIS policies, standards and guidelines

Data supply agreements

This page has information for Northern Territory Government agencies about supplying land information to external parties.

Policy

  1. Supply of Northern Territory Government land information to any external party will be under a data licensing agreement which defines the terms and conditions under which the data and information may be used.
  2. Terms and conditions of licence agreements will be consistent with approved policies and guidelines relating to data custodianship, data access, data protection, pricing and charging, copyright, liability and any intergovernmental arrangements entered into by the Northern Territory.

Definitions

Lead agency means the Department of Lands, Planning and the Environment.

External party means any individual, company or organisation external to the Northern Territory Government, whether in the public, private or academic sectors of the community.

Responsibility

Chief executives shall have responsibility for implementation of this policy.

Implementation

The lead agency will develop standard data licensing agreements for legal clearance by the Solicitor for the Northern Territory and consideration and endorsement by the Location Intelligence Group. 

Licence agreements should be developed to at least cover:

  • licensing of information for internal use only by the licensee
  • licensing of information for internal use and limited commercial use by the licensee
  • licensing of information for value adding and marketing by the licensee.

The standard agreements will address:

  • intended and allowable use
  • data protection, including copyright, privacy and national security interests
  • terms and conditions, including fees, accuracy and integrity, liability, cancellation of licence,

The penalties include:

  • where necessary, terms specific to the type of information supplied
  • where necessary, terms specific to the value adding of the information.

Background

Land-related information created and managed as a result of Northern Territory Government operations has a wide range of potential uses, most of which are in the best interests of the community.

Because some uses are unacceptable it is necessary for custodian agencies to maintain control of the use of data and information, irrespective of whether it is provided for commercial use or not. 

Such unacceptable uses can arise due to:

  • infringement of privacy or confidentiality
  • inappropriate applications that cannot be supported by the level of accuracy of the data
  • the data being highly dynamic and out of date copies being used to make decisions about immediate issues.

In addition to preventing general misuse, the government has specific interests with regard to liability and commercial exploitation of data and information.

The Copyright Act does not provide an adequate level of control over data and information in terms of how it may and may not be used.

Data supply or data licensing agreements are formal contracts between supplier and user, setting out exact terms and conditions under which data and information can be used. 

Such agreements can provide an adequate level of control.

Principles

In order to protect Government interests, ownership of government land information should not be transferred but only licensed for use under specific terms and conditions.

Licensees should not be permitted to on-supply data and information to third parties unless specifically authorised to do so under a licence.

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