‘Debacle’: Optus silent on Albo’s passport demand

Anthony Albanese has revealed Optus has not responded to an urgent demand from the federal government in the wake of the shock data breach.

Embattled telco Optus has not responded to a request to foot the bill for replacing millions of Australians’ passports in the wake of its data breach.

Almost 10 million Australians were impacted in the hack, with personal details ranging from their full name and address to their passport, drivers licence and Medicare numbers accessed by the hackers.

Anthony Albanese, who met with chief Kelly Bayer Rosmarin on Saturday, revealed the company has yet to respond to the government’s demand.

“The taxpayers shouldn’t pay for this. Our view is very clear. We’ll continue to pursue that view,” the Prime Minister told 5AA radio.

The federal government will urgently update data privacy laws in the wake of the Optus breach. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Nicki Connolly

“We await Optus to respond to our very clear, written request to them.”

On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Penny Wong asked for confirmation from Optus’ chief executive that the company would cover the costs of new passports.

A replacement passport costs $193.

“There is no justification for these Australians – or for taxpayers more broadly on their behalf – to bear the cost of obtaining a new passport,” she wrote in a letter.

The fallout of the breach has prompted the government to reassess Australia’s data and privacy laws, vowing to update them as a matter of urgency.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said Optus’ response had been a “mess” and a “debacle”, and the government was using the power of hindsight to make sure nothing like this could happen again.

Questions have swirled as to why Optus kept the data of customers, as well as former customers, for so many years.

Mr Dreyfus said he was hopeful the laws could be brought in “before the end of the year”.

“If a company says we need to see your driver’s licence or we need to see your passport number for the purpose of establishing that you are who you say you are, that should be the end – one might think – of the company keeping all that data,” he said.

Almost 10 million Australians have been caught up in the breach. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Nicki Connolly

“They don’t seem to me to have a valid reason for saying ‘we need to keep that for the next decade’. Obviously, the more data that’s kept the bigger the problem there is about keeping it safe, the bigger the problem there is about the potential damage that’s going to be done by a huge hack like what’s happened here.”

Mr Dreyfus said the Privacy Act desperately needed to be updated.

“We know that there needs to be reform. Regrettably, the former government simply sat on the need for reform, the need to bring the Privacy Act into the digital age,” he said.

“We’re terribly concerned about this huge data breach … We are looking at what urgent reforms can now be made.”

Anthony Albanese told parliament on Wednesday that the laws needed to be overhauled.

“Clearly, we need better national laws after a decade of inaction to manage the immense amount of data collected by companies about Australians, and clear consequences for when they do manage (it),” the Prime Minister said.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus have said updating the laws needed to be a matter of priority. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

The federal government is also looking into providing some Australians with replacement Medicare numbers, with Health Minister Mark Butler saying the government was “furious” the telco had taken five days to alert it to the issue.

“We were not notified that among passport details, drivers licence details and others that Medicare details had also been the subject of this breach,” he told ABC Radio on Wednesday.

“So we’re very concerned obviously about the loss of this data, and we’re working very hard to deal with the consequences of that.”

Mr Albanese said the government expected Optus “to do everything within its means to support affected customers”.

Home Affairs Minister Claire O’Neil has also flagged increasing fines for companies who fail to protect Australians’ data.

Originally published as ‘Debacle’: Optus silent on Albo’s passport demand