Skip to main content

New South Wales traffic management systems vulnerable, audit finds

The Audit Office of New South Wales (NSW) has found that although the Roads and Maritime Services and Transport for NSW has deployed many controls to protect traffic management systems, these would have been only partially effective in detecting and preventing incidents and unlikely to support a timely response. There was a potential for unauthorised access to sensitive information and systems that could have disrupted traffic. Until Roads and Maritime Services’ IT disaster recovery site is fully commiss
January 22, 2015 Read time: 2 mins
The Audit Office of New South Wales (NSW) has found that although the 6722 Roads and Maritime Services and Transport for NSW has deployed many controls to protect traffic management systems, these would have been only partially effective in detecting and preventing incidents and unlikely to support a timely response. There was a potential for unauthorised access to sensitive information and systems that could have disrupted traffic.

Until Roads and Maritime Services’ IT disaster recovery site is fully commissioned, a disaster involving the main data centre is likely to lead to higher congestion in the short-term as traffic controllers would be operating on a regional basis without the benefit of the Traffic Management Centre.

'Roads and Maritime Services worked well with the Audit Office throughout the audit and have already started acting on the recommendations made in the report,' said the Auditor-General Grant Hehir.

'Other government agencies with critical infrastructure should also seek to determine whether there are lessons from this audit that may apply to their organisations,' he added.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Innovation without the chaos
    July 23, 2025
    Effective governance is required to ensure that artificial intelligence remains an asset rather than a liability, says Rafael Hernandez of IntelliRoad. He lays out his case here…
  • Challenges and benefits of adaptive signal control
    April 23, 2013
    Delcan’s Joe Lam, who managed the first computerised signal system in the world, provides an expert insight into adaptive signal control. There are no gadgets in the world that regulate our daily behaviour as much as traffic signals, except perhaps our mobile phones. It has been estimated that the daily commuter goes through at least 10 signals on his journey to work. However, unlike mobile phones, traffic signals cannot be ignored or switched off by their daily users, at least not without legal consequence
  • Major upgrade for Mississippi bridges
    September 3, 2013
    Four major bridges over the lower Mississippi are to get intelligent transportation systems (ITS) upgrades, thanks to a US$10 million grant from the US Department of Transportation TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) fund. The project will expand existing ITS systems in each of the three states to complement previous state and private investments.
  • TM 2.0 boost TMC data feed and driver influence
    November 15, 2017
    TM 2.0 views connected vehicles and V2I as two-way communications channels, benefitting traffic management and drivers, as Alan Dron discovers. As connected vehicles are progressively rolled out there will come a point at which traffic managers and traffic management centres (TMCs) will have to gear up to cope with a rapidly-evolving road scenario. The TM 2.0 Platform (see box) is promoting a concept of new-generation traffic management (which carries the same TM 2.0 title) and is studying how future T