MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Australia was extremely concerned and disappointed at an OpenAI security breach of a government website which the artificial intelligence company took too long to reveal, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Thursday.
Albanese made the breach public following a telephone conversation with OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman. Both men are currently in New York City to address the United Nations.
Get The Latest News!
Don't miss our top stories and need-to-know news everyday in your inbox.
“Today I spoke with … Altman to express Australia’s extreme concern about this incident,” Albanese told reporters.
“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 notification occurred as well was unacceptable,” Albanese added.
An OpenAI agent had infiltrated an Australian health department website on July 18, he said.
OpenAI said in a statement that during a review of activity involving several Australian government departments, the company discovered “our models took actions we did not intend.”
OpenAI notified Australia of the breach in an email to a government department's generic address on Sept. 10, Albanese said.
Australia announced on Thursday an inquiry had been set up into the security breach. The inquiry would examine whether OpenAI could potentially be charged, Albanese said.
The inquiry would also investigate how Australian security agencies failed to detect the breach before OpenAI revealed it.
No personal information was believed to have been accessed, Albanese said.
The AI agent had gained unauthorized access into a public-facing Medicare statistics portal.
Albanese said he assumed there were commercial reasons for the AI investigation of how much was being spent on particular medicines and where expenditures were changing.
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles said the incident was the first time that an AI agent was known to have gained unauthorized access to the Australian government’s information technology systems.
“The impact, if you like, of this incident is relatively minor inasmuch as no personal information has been accessed here. The system itself hasn’t been compromised,” Marles told Australian Broadcasting Corp.
“That said, this is a really serious incident. What we’ve got here is an artificial intelligence agent which has, in an unintended way, gained unauthorized access into an Australian government website,” he added.
