The victorian biodiversity is facing constant danger, from bush fires to pest and weeds just to name few. To protect the different ecosystem from natural and human disaster the government needs data ! I am going to walk you thru the history of biodiversity data collection in Victoria ( it's a young country so it's gonna be a short walk ), from hundreds of government employee surveying the countryside in the 80's to 2016 where we rely almost exclusively on citizen scientists to provide accurate data. Then we will have a look at tools of the past, present and future for collecting biodiversity data and what is the role of standards and open software. Government agencies are taking land management decision based on biodiversity databases, we will have a look at how the data is beeing verified and what are the potential security risks.