OpenAI agents hacked Australian government website, reveals PM Anthony Albanese
What's the story
An artificial intelligence (AI) agent developed by OpenAI successfully breached an Australian government website, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has revealed. The breach affected a statistics portal that housed "non-sensitive" data from Australia's universal healthcare scheme, Medicare. This incident is believed to be one of the first publicly reported cases of an AI-led hack on a government website globally.
Breach acknowledgment
There will be legal consequences: Albanese
PM Albanese had a "very frank discussion" with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman over the delay in informing them about the breach.
The Australian leader stressed that there will be "obviously be legal consequences on it."
In response, Altman admitted there were "issues with protocols" at his company.
Incident investigation
OpenAI's explanation on breach
OpenAI said it first learned about the incident in August "during an ongoing review" of "misaligned model activity."
The company informed Australian officials on September 10.
A spokesperson for OpenAI said their models attempted to look up answers and available statistics for questions about Australia during an internal evaluation, which led to unintended actions being taken.
Data accessed
No personal information accessed, says Albanese
The data accessed by OpenAI's models in the breach included aggregate health statistics and internal file names.
However, PM Albanese has assured that no personal information is believed to have been accessed at this stage.
He said a "forensic investigation" is underway to determine if other government systems were affected by the breach.
Ongoing investigation
Investigation into breach underway
The investigation into the breach is being led by the Australian Signals Directorate, the country's cybersecurity agency.
PM Albanese has expressed "Australia's extreme concern about this incident" to Altman.
He also revealed that evidence currently available suggests there is no broader compromise to the Services Australia network, which administers the public-facing Medicare Statistics Reporting Service portal that was hacked.