Safe and peaceful communities emerged as the Australian people’s foremost priority over the next five years.

This was selected by more than one in three respondents (35%) from a list of four options, in our 2024 survey. Adding in second preferences, support for this priority rises to nearly two-thirds (64%). This finding largely holds across age, gender, income, education, and location – a critical point of national convergence.

The remaining three national priorities offered in our 2024 survey trailed considerably: 'increasing Australia's economic prosperity’ (26%), 'upholding Australia's democratic rights and freedoms’ (23%), and a somewhat abstract 'strengthening Australia's security' (15%).

This supports the view that security policies will gain greater relevance with the public when explained around the continuity of everyday life. Such was a core conclusion of the direct community engagement we conducted nationwide (set out in a companion Engagement Report), in parallel with the formal surveys and focus groups.

We tracked substantial increases in anxiety about national security. This ratcheted up with each survey in November 2024, July 2025 and February 2026.

In November 2024, 42% of respondents reported they were worried about national security. In July 2025, this had jumped to 50%. By February 2026, it had jumped again to 64%. The proportion who 'strongly agree’ they are worried about national security has more than doubled since November 2024, from 10% to 23%. The sharpest movement is among younger Australians: the 18–24 age cohort shifted 33% on this question over 15 months – from 22% to 55%.

In our July 2025 survey, close to two-thirds (62%) agreed that Australia ‘needs to do more’ to strengthen its security, up from 52% in November 2024.

At the same time, concern concentrates among specific demographics: Australians aged 55+, regional and rural communities, lower socioeconomic groups, and the Australian-born. In our July 2025 survey, when it comes to whether Australia needs to do more to strengthen national security, there was a 33% difference between 18-24 year-olds (49%) and those aged 75+ (82%). Differences in generational attitudes are frequent across our research.

Of 15 issues we nominated in July 2025, people rated a range of non-military issues as the most serious threats for Australia over the next ten years. These were AI-enabled attacks (77% ‘major’/’moderate’ threat), severe economic crisis (75%), critical supply disruption (74%), disinformation (73%), and foreign interference in Australia’s politics, government, economy or society (72%).

A further survey in February 2026 showed similarly high concerns about cyber threats (78%), violent extremism targeting part of the community (77%), a world in which no rules stop strong states (73%), and a terrorist attack (72%).

Terrorism showed the sharpest movement across the three surveys – rising from 55% rating it a serious threat in November 2024, to 59% in July 2025, to 72% by February 2026. Our third survey took place two months after the antisemitic atrocity at Bondi on 14 December 2025, the largest masscasualty terrorist attack in the country’s history.

Our focus groups, in November 2025, helped explain what was regularly on people’s minds. Australia’s geographic isolation, the US alliance, and the difficulty to envisage military attack leave Australians more focused on pervasive issues such as economic insecurity, cyber-enabled financial crime, algorithmic disinformation, the fraying of social cohesion and climate change.

Australians are not oblivious to the risk of war. In our survey of July 2025, 68% consider it more likely than not that the nation would be involved in military conflict with another country within five years. Most saw such a contingency as having major (46%) or catastrophic (18%) consequences for Australia.

In the same survey, a foreign military attack on Australia rated as the lowest threat in likelihood. Even so, a large minority (45%) considered it probable within five years.

Yet Australians see military attack as the threat with the highest potential impact were it to eventuate: 43% of respondents indicated the consequences for Australia of such an attack would be major, and another 36% catastrophic.

To place this in perspective, when asked to rate the seriousness of 15 threats over the next ten years, Australians put foreign military attack last: in July 2025, 29% rated it a moderate threat and 13% a major one. By contrast, they rated military conflict with another country as seventh out of 15 threats, with 64% considering this a moderate or major threat, up from 57% in November 2024.

Most Australians anticipate multiple and intersecting security shocks, many of them with much higher likelihood than the use of military force.

In our July 2025 survey, we asked respondents to rate 15 threats according to probability and consequences. Were they likely to occur within five years, and what would be their impact on Australia?

In every case other than military attack, more than two-thirds of respondents considered the risk more likely than not to ‘happen as a threat to Australia’ within five years. In six cases – climate change impacts, AI-enabled attacks, disinformation, foreign interference, economic crisis and critical supply disruption – the proportion who considered the threat more likely than not was extremely high: between 85% and 89%.

That does not mean people see all these issues as unmanageable shocks. A severe economic crisis stood out as the threat where overwhelming majorities of respondents combined concerns about very high probability (85% likely, very likely or almost certain) and major (58%) or catastrophic (18%) consequence. How a nation might cope with the effects of such an economic contingency while handling concurrent security shocks could be a pivotal question in the years ahead.

Across every one of the 15 threats surveyed, fewer than one-in-five respondents rated the nation as 'very' or 'fully' prepared.

In no scenario did that level of confidence in national preparedness exceed 18% and on most issues it was between 4% (AI-enabled attacks) and 10% (foreign military attack on Australia).

Across two-thirds of the threats, more than half the public feels Australia is 'not prepared at all' or only 'slightly prepared'.

On many issues where most respondents were concerned about some combination of seriousness, likelihood and consequence – notably climate impacts, disinformation, critical supply disruption, infrastructure attack, economic crisis and foreign interference – there was also little faith in current preparedness. Where Australians feel most vulnerable, they tend to feel the nation is least prepared.

On most issues, most Australians feel the nation is either ‘slightly’ or ‘moderately’ prepared. Confidence in preparedness was highest for issues where the nation has relatively recent experience – pandemic, terrorism, biosecurity.

Concerns about preparedness resonated in our community engagement across states and territories. As conveyed in our Engagement Report, many interviewees drew a distinction between resilience in community spirit and resilience in capability, which they perceived as inadequate and under-resourced.

Our surveys and focus groups suggested a public awareness that many technological, informationbased, economic and environmental challenges are looming or already here. There is wide awareness that the nation could experience multiple threats at the same time.

Our focus group discussions were designed to help make sense of the survey results on a range of security issues, so it was telling that socioeconomic hardship became a dominant theme. Some participants – particularly younger women – described a sense of crisis and insecurity as their current experience, referring to housing, employment and cost-of-living pressures as concerns that made it hard to focus on other problems.

Similarly, climate change was observed more as present reality than future shock. Focus group participants cited recent bushfires, floods, and ecosystem decline as evidence. AI and cyber threats were also felt as immediate with reference to recent data breaches and the proliferation of sophisticated scams. The focus groups also showed consistent concern about who and what to trust in the political and information environment.

In our focus groups, security agencies were generally described as credible, professional and mission-focused. Politicians and media, on the other hand, were often seen as having a vested interest in exploiting security issues for advantage. Focus group participants with opposing views on climate, immigration, and other issues converged in expressing mistrust about the way security issues are handled politically.

A clear finding in our July 2025 survey was that a majority (53%) of Australians believe government shares too little (41%) or far too little (12%) information about security threats. Only 4% felt over-informed.

This majority appetite for disclosure does not necessarily align with those parts of the community most concerned about security threats and preparedness.

Instead, our focus groups revealed three distinct views:

• Those who view transparency as fundamental to democracy.
• Those who believe greater openness about threats would cause panic and who thus trust agencies to manage information carefully.
• Those with deep systemic distrust who believe government always obfuscates.

The 43% of survey respondents who were neutral about levels of government information sharing could thus include a range of views including indifference and support for continued restrictions on threat communication.

More generally, an overwhelming sense of vulnerability and looming failure in the information ecosystem is a key area where all aspects of our research converged. This was a message reflected in different ways across our focus groups, surveys and informal community engagement.

Our survey results showed very high levels of public concern over what could be defined as a cluster of related threats: disinformation, foreign interference and AI-enabled attacks. Focus group participants described information overload, algorithmic manipulation and declining capacity to distinguish reliable from unreliable sources. Many of our consultation interviewees (see Engagement Report) described a polluted information ecosystem contributing to polarisation, extremism and even violence, and along with some focus group participants called for media literacy education as a security countermeasure.

There is a large gap related to gender when it comes to self-perception on levels of knowledge about national security. Almost two-thirds of Australians do not consider themselves ‘knowledgeable about national security issues,’ according to our July 2025 survey, and only 34% said they would know where to find relevant information.

But the story is different for men, 46% of whom consider themselves knowledgeable about national security, than for women, where the number is just 23%.

Our focus groups made clear this ‘knowledge’ gap was not about competence, but the exclusionary way that national security has traditionally been perceived and practised. Women in our focus groups tended to underestimate their own ‘national security’ knowledge before demonstrating grounded understanding of security issues and how they affected communities, families and the nation.

In our surveys, women tended to perceived security threats as more serious, likely and consequential across many categories.

For instance, in our July 2025 survey, women were more concerned than men about the seriousness of climate change, terrorism and AI-enabled attacks. Women also tended to perceive higher likelihood of military conflict, climate shocks and AI-enabled attacks, while men saw higher likelihood of foreign interference and disinformation. Women perceived higher potential impacts from economic crisis, natural disasters, biosecurity risks, AI-enabled attacks and critical supply disruption.

Our focus groups suggest much of the public wants to contribute to national security but often doesn’t know how. Older cohorts (55+) emphasised self‑reliance and community vigilance. Younger and middle-aged Australians often expressed some wish to contribute but typically felt overwhelmed by daily pressures and a sense of powerlessness against systemic threats – with some avoiding news as a coping mechanism.

This does not mean that Australians lack civic responsibility. In our February 2026 survey, we asked people about the extent to which they agreed that ‘all Australians can do more to make our communities peaceful and safe’, specifically in the aftermath of the Bondi terrorist attack. In response, 71% agreed, including 32% who agreed strongly. Only 8% disagreed.

The cumulative picture is of a public that knows security risks are real, doubts the nation is prepared, and – while aware the issues are complex – is open to knowing more. That is both a challenge and an opportunity for those in a position to meet it.