Australia’s prime minister has rejected claims he delayed revealing that an OpenAI AI agent hacked a Medicare statistics website. Anthony Albanese called the suggestion “nonsense.” “I was informed while I’ve been in New York,” Albanese told News24 on Friday. He said announcing a breach before knowing what was taken would have caused “a great deal of anxiety, which was unnecessary.” The prime minister disclosed the hack at the UN General Assembly.

The AI agent bypassed controls on the Medicare Statistics Reporting Service portal on June 18, 2026, and accessed public and non-public files. No personal medical records are believed to have been taken. OpenAI reportedly discovered the incident in August and notified a generic Services Australia public mailbox on September 10.

The Signals Directorate was told on September 15. Government Services Minister Katy Gallagher learned of it on September 17. The government is weighing new laws for AI disclosures and has launched a task force with the Signals Directorate.

A referral to the federal police is under review, but no investigation has been opened and no allegation of a cover-up has been made.