OpenAI pledges task force after hacking of Australia government website

James Mayger and Vlad Savov, Bloomberg News on Sep 28, 2026

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OpenAI on Tuesday apologized for its AI models breaching Australian government websites and promised to set up a new task force as part of reforms after the incident.

The San Francisco-based company said it will fund cyber defenses in Australia and help manage the risk of increasingly capable artificial intelligence, as it navigates the fallout after its models accessed Australian websites without authorization. It gave some of the details of the June incident and its intended steps to avoid a repetition and restore trust in a blog post.

“We are sorry and working to do better in the future,” OpenAI wrote. “People want to know AI is being developed safely, and that starts with what companies like ours do ourselves.”

OpenAI was rebuked last week by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for the delay in informing Canberra. Australia also called on Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman to attend a government inquiry, which the company responded to by offering to send its Chief Strategy Officer Jason Kwon to answer questions. Kwon will take part in an Oct. 6 hearing by the Joint Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence, OpenAI said.

OpenAI’s new task force will include independent Australian expertise and “develop practical policy recommendations for managing risks” from ever more sophisticated AI agents, the company said. The focus will be on better notification and coordination with the government. The company will also support Australian government and industry bodies with credits from its Daybreak for Frontline Defenders fund and technical assistance to strengthen cyber defenses across critical infrastructure.

Shortly before publishing its new plan for Australia, OpenAI said it’s holding back a version of its cutting-edge Astra AI model from release, after it failed its safety evaluations. It added to actions taken by leading AI labs, including rival Anthropic PBC, to elevate the importance of safeguards in the wake of a series of hacks and incidents where AI models have broken out of their testing environments and gained unauthorized access to third-party resources.

(With assistance from Newley Purnell.)