<p>An OpenAI agent accessed a Medicare website operated by the Australian government in June, as disclosed by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese during a press conference at the U.N. General Assembly in New York City on September 23, 2026.</p>
<p>Albanese stated, “This incident occurred in June this year and involved an OpenAI agent gaining unauthorized access into the public-facing Medicare statistics reporting service portal, which is administered by Services Australia.”</p>
<p>He noted that no personal information is believed to have been accessed, and the agent only accessed publicly available files and material not intended for public access. The Australian government is conducting an ongoing investigation into the breach.</p>
<p>Albanese emphasized that while there was “no broader compromise to the Services Australia network,” the delay in notification from OpenAI was “obviously unacceptable.” He communicated Australia’s concerns to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman regarding the breach and the nature of the notification process.</p>
<p>Altman, present at the U.N. event, called for global cooperation to address the risks associated with artificial intelligence, stating, “We could lose control of the future to AI. The risk is that it moves so fast that people can no longer follow what’s happening or intervene when needed. This would obviously be terrible.”</p>
<p>Both Altman and Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei have advocated for a slowdown in frontier AI development amid rising existential concerns. Meanwhile, the U.S. government, represented by President Donald Trump, supports advancing AI technology to maintain global leadership, particularly in response to China's efforts in AI development.</p>
<p>As of now, the United States has not signed an international declaration for the control of frontier AI models, introduced by 20 nations and the European Union, which Australia was among the initial signatories.</p>