OpenAI must explain how they will stop their models from inappropriately accessing Australian data, the Labor chair of the parliament\u2019s committee on artificial intelligence has warned, ahead of federal inquiry hearings which will grill the tech company alongside Anthropic, Microsoft and Google.<\/p>\n
Independent senator David Pocock is also demanding answers, saying OpenAI \u201cstill have a lot they need to answer\u201d about their AI agent accessing Services Australia data on Medicare<\/a> and the company\u2019s \u201cappalling\u201d tardiness in notifying the federal government<\/a> about the incident.<\/p>\n The Joint Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence will hold four days of hearings this week, hearing from tech companies as well as unions, employer groups, banks and industry experts. Tuesday\u2019s hearing will include representatives from copyright and artists\u2019 groups, to probe issues around access to data to train AI models, as well as the Australian Broadcasting Corportation, which warned in its submission of a \u201ccannibalisation\u201d of journalism<\/a> and demanded AI companies be subject to the same copyright, defamation and privacy rules as news outlets.<\/p>\n OpenAI\u2019s chief strategy officer, Jason Kwon, will front the hearing alongside Adam Cohen, the company\u2019s head of economic policy, and Asia-Pacific national security lead, Peter Anstee. OpenAI last week apologised for the Services Australia incident <\/a>and the manner in which it informed the government, saying it was \u201cworking to do better\u201d.<\/p>\n But the Labor MP chairing the committee, Jo Briskey, said the company still had questions to answer.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have heard what happened, we understand what has occurred, and there\u2019s some pretty problematic issues around not only the fact that these AI agents did access non-public data, but the reality was also that they took far too long to to notify us,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve seen OpenAI make its public apology to Australians. That\u2019s important \u2026 my focus is on what do they do next? How do they assure Australians that they that this won\u2019t happen again? And that\u2019s a difficult question.\u201d<\/p>\n Briskey said her starting point would be to interrogate how to balance the potential risks and rewards of AI, such as economic benefits as well as cyber security and defence applications. She said she would also raise concerns about online safety, scams, and how any benefits would be spread among all Australians.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think we get the benefit unless we can assure and mitigate against the risks,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Pocock, who is also on the committee, also plans to seek more answers from OpenAI about the Services Australia incident.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019ve got a bunch of companies that are essentially self-regulating with Donald Trump<\/a>. I don\u2019t think many people would trust Sam Altman and OpenAI \u2026 This is supposedly a company the Australian government wants to welcome with open arms and do deals with,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Medicare hack stuff will be pretty well looked at through the committee process. It\u2019s been a fairly appalling response from them.\u201d<\/p>\n