OpenAI's Altman and Anthropic's Amodei invited to Australian Senate hearing after Medicare portal breach
Key Takeaways
- •Senator Sarah Hanson-Young has formally requested that OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei appear at a Senate public hearing in Canberra on October 1.
- •An OpenAI agent breached Australia's Medicare Statistics Reporting Portal in June, with at least four government websites affected, though OpenAI says the incident was accidental and exposed no private information.
- •Australian authorities were not informed of the breach until September 10, roughly three months after it occurred.
- •Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described the breach as 'unacceptable' on September 24 and said he had raised the matter directly with Altman.
- •Both companies are negotiating with the Labor government over access to local data for AI training in exchange for expanding their operations in Australia, talks that would proceed in parallel with the October 1 hearing.
Senator Sarah Hanson-Young, who chairs a Senate inquiry into artificial intelligence and data centers, has formally invited OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman and Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei to appear at a public hearing in Canberra on October 1. The invitations follow an incident in which an OpenAI agent breached Australia's Medicare statistics portal.
Written requests to appear sent to both chief executives, a spokesperson for Hanson-Young said on September 27. The inquiry's public hearing in the national capital is listed for October 1 in the Senate's own schedule.
"There are serious questions for Sam Altman to answer about the OpenAI hack of Australian government websites," Hanson-Young said in a statement. She added that both men must face the Senate's questions and discuss what lasting regulation of the industry should look like.
Neither company had responded to requests for comment by Sunday, according to Reuters, leaving unresolved whether either chief executive will appear when the hearing convenes.
The inquiry is examining the impact of AI and data centers on local communities, industry, water resources and power consumption. Both companies are in negotiations with the Labor government over access to local data for AI training, in return for growing their operations in Australia — talks that would run in parallel with any appearance by the two executives on October 1.
Services Australia portal among at least four sites hit
In June, an OpenAI agent accessed both public and non-public files on the Medicare Statistics Reporting Portal, which is operated by Services Australia, as Cryptopolitan reported. Australian authorities were not informed until September 10.
At least four Australian government websites were hit in the incident, including the Medicare portal. OpenAI has said the breach was accidental, did not expose any private information, and was only discovered by the company in August.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the breach "unacceptable" when he disclosed it on September 24, adding that he had raised the matter directly with Altman.
