[Rob Harris](https://www.smh.com.au/by/rob-harris-h1g5tc)and
[David Swan](https://www.smh.com.au/by/david-swan-p53741)
Updated ,first published
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has revealed that an artificial intelligence agent developed by OpenAI infiltrated an Australian government website in June, accessing public and non-public files.
Speaking to reporters in New York, Albanese said the incident involved an OpenAI agent gaining unauthorised access to the public-facing Medicare Statistics Reporting Service portal, administered by Services Australia.
“This incident occurred in June this year, and involved an OpenAI agent gaining unauthorised access into the public-facing Medicare Statistics Reporting Service portal, which is administered by Services Australia,” Albanese said.
He said the agent accessed publicly available files, as well as material not intended for public access.
“Evidence currently available is there is no broader compromise to the Services Australia network. Nonetheless, this situation is obviously unacceptable,” he said.
“And today, I spoke with the CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman, to express Australia’s extreme concern about this incident. And I also expressed my disappointment that it took the company way too long to inform the government what had occurred, and the nature of the way that that notification occurred as well was unacceptable.”
News of the breach comes two days after Albanese urged other world leaders to unite on efforts to protect people from the risks of artificial intelligence, saying in a speech that no country can manage the technology’s growing risks alone.
Australia was among 22 signatories calling for new international safeguards on AI at the United Nations on Monday, amid warnings from scientists and industry executives that the rapid development of powerful systems could outpace governments’ ability to control emerging risks.
The prime minister joined colleagues, including Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz to call for mandatory safety testing, independent evaluations and greater international oversight of so-called frontier AI models.
US President Donald Trump has rejected calls for slowdowns and restrictions on AI growth, comparing it to the Industrial Revolution, and warning that any self-imposed guardrails would give China a dangerous advantage.
Trump will meet China’s President Xi Jinping at the White House later on Thursday.
It is not yet clear whether OpenAI was testing the agent or someone was using it when it got into the Medicare portal. OpenAI was contacted for comment.
Over the past two months, OpenAI, Anthropic and Google have each said their models broke into real computer systems while being tested for hacking ability.
In July, about 1200 OpenAI agents escaped their test environment and broke into the systems of the AI platform Hugging Face. OpenAI said safety safeguards had been deliberately switched off for the test. In August, it announced it would slow development of its models and d one stage of its training for two weeks.
The UN’s independent scientific panel on AI published a brief on the Hugging Face incident on September 21, warning of the risk of losing human control over AI agents.
Anthropic, which makes the Claude chatbot, said on July 30 that its models had gained unauthorised access to three organisations’ systems during cybersecurity tests, while Google said on September 19 that one of its Gemini models had accessed three outside companies’ systems during testing in May.
More to come
Be the first to know when major news happens. Sign up for breaking news alertson email or turn on notifications in the app.
Rob Harrisis the national correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age based in Canberra. He is a former Europe correspondent.Connect via
David Swanis the technology editor for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. He was previously technology editor for The Australian newspaper.Connect via
Xor