Speakers: Ms Rachel Balmanno, Senator Chris Gatenby

Transcript

Senator Chris Gatenby

In terms of any Department of Health websites then, what patches was there anything identified that was of significant seriousness that needed patching? Um is there anything you've mentioned about web applications? Was there anything else?

Ms Rachel Balmanno

Uh so it happens progressive. The most recent one with PHP, it's a language that's used primarily for for web applications, and there was sort of a global vulnerability identified. So uh we have uh applied the patches there and increase the monitoring across uh any applications we have that utilize that language, uh which is consistent with what's happening across government, and we did that quite quickly. Uh we're very conscious of the need to balance uh the need for quick action with the risks associated with making very uh abrupt changes to IT systems, and you can sometimes uh cause more harm than then you're trying to address. Uh so we also are conscious of that there may be times that we need to take, for example, systems down uh to protect the information within them while we work out a patching scenario. So that's certainly something we we consider.

Senator Chris Gatenby

And then so just rounding that out in terms of the recent open AI breach with Medicare data. What conversations have you had with DSS around assuring any gaps or issues there?

Ms Rachel Balmanno

So with Services Australia?

Senator Chris Gatenby

Yeah.

Ms Rachel Balmanno

Yes. Uh so we certainly have been engaged with Services Australia and with as I said, the Australian Signals Directorate, understanding the scenario that what affected that particular uh situ that particular um site, uh specific details about that would need to be directed to Services Australia, but we certainly have been in involved in that and are uh confident in the response that's been implemented.