Australia wants privacy rules to alert banks after data breach

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Monday that Australia's second-largest telecommunications firm was targeted by hackers, and Australia wants to change its privacy rules so that banks can be alerted faster after cyber attacks.

Optus, owned by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd, revealed last week that databases containing home addresses, drivers licences and passport numbers of up to 10 million customers - about 40% of Australia's population - were compromised in one of the biggest data breaches in the country.

The attacker's IP address, the unique identifier of a computer, appeared to move between countries in Europe, according to the company. It hasn't said anything about how the attacker breached its security.

Albanese called it a massive breach and a huge wake-up call for the corporate sector. Albanese said there were some state actors and criminal organisations who want to access people's data.

Albanese told 4 BC that we want to make sure that we change some privacy provisions so that people are caught up like this, so the banks can protect their customers as well, as well as that, because of the privacy provisions there, Albanese said.

The federal government is planning to require businesses to alert banks in the event that customer data is compromised, so that lenders can monitor affected accounts for suspicious activity, Australian media reported.

Over the weekend, more details will be announced by the government over the weekend. Australia has been looking to beef up its defence and in 2020 pledged to spend A $1.66 billion $1.1 billion to strengthen network infrastructure of companies and households, according to cybersecurity minister Clare O'Neill.