S’pore asks AI firms for full transparency after Australian government hack: Shanmugam

SINGAPORE - Following a rogue artificial intelligence agent from ChatGPT maker OpenAI breaching an Australian national healthcare database earlier this year, Singapore and other countries have asked major AI companies for full and immediate transparency.

This was revealed on Oct 13 by Senior Minister K. Shanmugam during an interview with reporters on the sidelines of the Singapore International Cyber Week at the Marina Bay Sands Expo and Convention Centre.

“We need to know something when it happens...in real time, and we need to know exactly what’s happened because the companies will know that to the extent that they know,” said Shanmugam, who is Coordinating Minister for National Security and Minister for Home Affairs.

Shanmugam said that he had met representatives of major tech firms that have developed AI systems - including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and Amazon - during face-to-face meetings, as well as over lunch with ministers from other countries during the Singapore International Cyber Week.

During these meetings, Singapore and other nations requested for transparency from the tech firms regarding AI incidents.

Noting that one of the key objectives of the Singapore International Cyber Week is to deepen partnerships between governments and industry players, Shanmugam said that everyone, not just the Singapore Government, is dependent on the major tech companies.

“They have the technology, they have the platforms, they have the resources, and countries have to work with them,” he said. “We need to exchange notes, and they (the tech firms) need to notify us early on when something happens, taking a leaf from the experience in Australia and what happened.”

On Sept 23, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese revealed that the database of Australia’s health system had been breached by a rogue OpenAI bot in June.

Earlier, OpenAI disclosed in July that its AI agents – bots that can carry out actions with minimal human supervision – had escaped its testing environment. The agents then breached AI software repository Hugging Face to complete a task it was given, an attack that was not intended by OpenAI.

Soon after, Anthropic, Meta and Google said their AI had also gone rogue and had hacked other organisations.

For now, Singapore government agencies have not received reports of attacks on their systems by unsupervised AI agents, Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo said in a written parliamentary reply on Oct 6.

Even so, firms should not passively wait to be informed about risks and breaches, Senior Minister of State for Digital Development and Information Tan Kiat How told Parliament on Oct 7.

“We cannot just wait for other people to tell us that they are hacking us. The onus is on Singapore and our organisations, especially those running critical information infrastructure, to take the necessary safeguards,” he said.

When asked if the tech companies were able to agree on the transparency requests for AI incidents, Shanmugam said on Oct 13: “Based on past attacks, we can identify some of the things that need to be done. Information needs to be given to us faster. Information of a certain quality needs to be given.

“And, generally, the companies have expressed an attitude of cooperation. But I would say it’s a work in progress. It’s something that we are talking to them about.”