The ACMA

Australian Communications and Media Authority

Status Regulator · unfunded mandate

The regulator handed every new lever in the 2026 gambling laws: the broadcast caps, the triple lock, the takedown notices, BetStop, and now the opt-out register. It told the Senate committee it received no new funding for the advertising side and is reallocating staff internally.

Last on record: 2026-10
Named in: 7 articles
Across: 4 cases

Named in 7 articles across 4 cases 32 connections: companies 12, lobbies 1, mechanisms 6, regulators and bodies 4, agencies and departments 4, police 2, people 3

Key figure on file

Dollar figures in the explanatory memorandum for the levy that funds the register: none. The amount is left to a later ACMA legislative instrument be… EM, Interactive Gambling (Cost Recovery Levy) Bill 2026

Articles naming it

Cases it recurs across

Linked in the graph

Figures on file

Fig. 01 / Where this name appears

The Triple Zero RortNo known harmACMA member Samantha Yorke, in the same release: "While we are not aware of anyone being directly harmed due to the non-compliance in this case, it…4 articles →The Gambling Rort$0Dollar figures in the explanatory memorandum for the levy that funds the register: none. The amount is left to a later ACMA legislative instrument …1 article →Media Ownership11 article →The Reporting Rort11 article →

Fig. 01Source: article scan · every article naming itAs of 2026‑10Auto-assembled

Fig. 02 / On the record

$0Dollar figures in the explanatory memorandum for the levy that funds the register: none. The amount is left to a later ACMA legislative instrument because the regulator's costs are not yet fully known. The register's build cost appears nowhere in the parliamentary record.Source: EM, Interactive Gambling (Cost Recovery Levy) Bill 2026The default is exposure →
No known harmACMA member Samantha Yorke, in the same release: "While we are not aware of anyone being directly harmed due to the non-compliance in this case, it's alarming that Optus placed so many customers in this position for so long."Source: ACMA, 6 March 2024Factual accuracy →
"Willingness to pay"ACMA, as reported by the ABC, said it determined penalty amounts based on a range of factors, some of which included the seriousness of the conduct and whether it was deliberate, reckless or inadvertent, and that it engaged with companies to test their 'willingness to pay' an infringement notice. The phrase is not in the FOI documents examined and not in the 25 February 2025 Estimates transcript.Source: ABC, 28 January 2025Factual accuracy →
No more than 1 business dayHow far ahead of publication ACMA says it will now tell an investigated entity of its intention to publish an investigation or enforcement outcome.Source: ACMA, answer to question on notice SQ26-000107Factual accuracy →
$20 million to $24 millionThe Telstra overcharging draft ACMA sent in advance of its 6 December 2023 release put the headline penalty and refund figure at $20 million; the release ACMA published put it at $24 million. The documents do not show who asked for the changes.Source: Documents ACMA released under freedom of informationFactual accuracy →
23 actions, 34 listed outcomesACMA says it undertook 23 enforcement actions from September 2023 to September 2024, resulting in outcomes it lists as 12 formal warnings, 2 remedial directions and 20 directions to comply, which total 34. ACMA does not say how many outcomes each of the 23 actions produced.Source: ACMA, correcting the recordFactual accuracy →
2,145 unsuccessful emergency callsACMA's count for 8 November 2023, by company: Optus Mobile 2,091, Optus Networks 41, Optus Internet 12 to 000 or 112 (2,144 in total), plus one call to 106.Source: ACMA investigation report, November 2024The calls that did not connect →
$30 millionThe same maximum applies to breaching an ACMA emergency call direction under section 151D of the TCPSS Act, since 31 October 2025.Who answers for Triple Zero →

Fig. 02Source: figures on file for this name, each tied to the article it came fromAs of 2026‑10Auto-assembled

How we know

The sources of the 7 articles that name the ACMA, by the tier the desk declared. A source supports its article, not necessarily a claim about the ACMA.

Evidence strength · 158 sources across 7 articles

Primary 74
Official 8
Masthead 27
Trade 18
Aggregator 6
25 not yet graded

Primary: the document itself: legislation, a court record, a filing, a regulator’s own publication
Official: the organisation’s own statement about itself
Masthead: a news organisation with a corrections policy, reporting the primary document
Trade: specialist or trade press
Aggregator: republishes others’ work

How sources are graded

6 of 7 articles are graded on every headline finding. How findings are graded

Fig. 03 / Named together

The 12 names most often in the same articles as The ACMA. A line's weight, and the number by each name, is how many articles name both. Grey chords join the neighbours most often named together themselves (two articles or more). Circles are people and organisations, squares are mechanisms. Named together is all this shows: it is not a finding about what the relationship is.

Fig. 03Source: article scan · articles naming bothAs of 2026‑10Auto-assembled