An artificial intelligence agent developed by OpenAI has gained unauthorised access to an Australian government health statistics portal, in what authorities say could be the first known case of an AI agent breaching a government website.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says the incident occurred in June when the agent accessed public and non-public files on the Medicare Statistics Reporting Service portal operated by Services Australia.
He says the portal contains non-sensitive health statistics and government spending information, while a forensic investigation is underway to determine the full extent of the incident.
Mr Albanese says he has expressed Australia’s extreme concern to OpenAI Chief Executive Officer, Sam Altman, particularly over the delay in notifying the government.
According to the Prime Minister, OpenAI did not notify Australian authorities until September 10, nearly three months after the incident.
OpenAI says it discovered the activity during an internal review of its AI models and found no evidence that patient records were accessed.
The company says the information accessed included aggregate health statistics and internal file names.
Australia has established a task force, with the Australian Signals Directorate assisting in the investigation.
Authorities say three other government systems may also have been affected, although there is currently no evidence that individual medical data was accessed.
