Reference

Glossary

Fifteen terms that come up over and over when we help people fix their BDBN. Written to be readable by a person who has never worked in super, law or security.

An open estate-planning book with reading glasses, a cup of tea and native eucalyptus on a warm linen desk — The words your fund uses — translated into the ones your family speaks.

BDBN: Binding Death Benefit Nomination. A signed direction to your super fund telling the trustee exactly who gets your death benefit. Lapses after 3 years under SIS Reg 6.17A unless non-lapsing and the trust deed allows it.
SIS Reg 6.17A: The Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Regulation that governs binding nominations — including the 3-year lapse, witness requirements and eligible-dependant rules.
SIS dependant: A person legally able to receive a super death benefit directly: spouse (including de facto), child of any age, financial dependant, or interdependency partner.
Interdependency relationship: A close personal relationship with financial and domestic support and personal care. Recognised under SIS as a valid beneficiary category.
Non-lapsing nomination: A binding nomination that does not expire after 3 years. Only offered by some funds, and only if their trust deed permits.
Reversionary pension: A pension that automatically continues to a named beneficiary (usually a spouse) on the member's death. Different mechanism to a BDBN.
Trustee discretion: What happens when there's no valid BDBN: the fund's trustee decides who receives the death benefit, guided by SIS dependant rules and any non-binding wishes.
USI: Unique Superannuation Identifier. The number that identifies a specific super product for rollovers and nominations.
MyGov / ATO lost super: The federal service that surfaces super accounts you've forgotten about. STEADCALM can pull these in automatically.
Post-quantum cryptography: Encryption designed to remain secure against attacks from future large-scale quantum computers. ML-KEM-768 key exchange is on the STEADCALM roadmap; today's vault uses AES-256 at rest and TLS 1.3 in transit.
AES-256: The symmetric encryption standard protecting every document and record in the STEADCALM vault at rest.
Zero-knowledge architecture: A system where the service provider cannot decrypt user data even in principle, because the keys never leave the user's device. On the STEADCALM roadmap — not yet in force.
Estate Brief: A STEADCALM PDF summarising every super fund, BDBN, financial asset and vault document in a form your solicitor and executor can act on immediately.
Inner Circle: The small group of people you nominate with granular, time-boxed access to specific parts of your vault in an emergency.
Emergency access OTP: A one-time password flow that lets a nominated contact request access to defined records, with a mandatory waiting period and full audit trail.