Assistant Minister for Science, Technology and the Digital Economy Andrew Charlton says incidents involving artificial intelligence agents are likely to become more common as the technology develops.
Speaking on ABC RN Breakfast, Charlton described the reported OpenAI agent access to a Medicare statistics portal as a novel cybersecurity event and said similar incidents could become “more and more prevalent” in the future.
He said the federal government wanted to inform Australians about the incident as quickly as possible after it was confirmed.
Charlton was also questioned about why Services Australia took five days to notify the Australian Signals Directorate after receiving OpenAI’s notification. He said responsibility for the delay rested primarily with OpenAI, criticising the company’s response as too slow and inadequate.
The minister said the notification was sent by email to a public inbox rather than being communicated through what he considered an appropriate channel for a serious cybersecurity incident.
Charlton said the government was still examining possible legal action and questions around liability, including how existing laws apply when an autonomous AI agent is not a legal person.
The federal government has launched a taskforce to investigate the Medicare incident and examine gaps in Australia’s laws and cybersecurity protections. The government has said no personal Medicare information is believed to have been accessed, although investigations remain underway.
Australia By Aussie previously reported on questions surrounding the timing of the government’s disclosure of the incident. That earlier report covered James Paterson’s comments about when and where the breach was publicly announced.
The incident has added to broader discussions about how AI companies should report security incidents and how responsibility should be handled when autonomous systems take actions without direct human control.
Source: The Guardian
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