A fifth major cyberattack has been disclosed within one month by Australia, as Australian Clinical Labs revealed the data of up to a quarter of a million patients and staff was accessed back in February, according to an article in Bloomberg. Between the five different disclosed attacks, records of more than 16 million people have been compromised, or roughly two-thirds of the population of the nation. With the data compromised including things like birth dates, passport information, driver’s licenses and credit cards, pressure is growing to improve the nation’s laws and regulations around cybersecurity.
Individuals are also calling for companies to established bug bounty programs, to help identify potential gaps in their security. Troy Hunt, who runs the breach tracking website haveibeenpwned.com, told Bloomberg, “Even if you don’t go all the way to a bounty program, you’ve got to make it easy to be reported. So long as the discovery and the reporting is done in an ethical fashion,” with the programs run by TikTok and Tesla being strong examples of companies supporting ethical hackers.
Australian companies are also criticized for not fully recognizing the importance of cybersecurity, and the need to have full-time resources at all levels of an organization, despite a report from the Australian Cyber Security Centre indicating reported ransomware attacks increased by 15% over the 2020-2021 financial year. Ajay Unni, CEO and founder of StickmanCyber, said to Bloomberg, “I still see companies that think they can’t be attacked. Taking action after the fact can cost them a lot more.”
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