Clare O’Neil makes emotional speech about Medibank ‘abortion leak’

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil has given an impassioned speech to parliament vowing to track down and and punish the ‘scumbag’ Medibank hackers.

Cybercriminals stole the medical data of thousands of Medibank Private members and after their ransom demands were refused, leaked some on the dark web.

Hackers claimed some of the data included details of women’s abortions, and threatened to leak more unless they were paid US$9.7 million.

Ms O’Neil warned the leak would likely get worse and during Question Time on Thursday acknowledged ‘those fears have been realised’.

‘I want to say, particularly to the women whose private health information has been compromised overnight, I know this is a really difficult time,’ she said.

‘I want you to know that as a parliament and as a government, we stand with you. You are entitled to keep your health information private and what has occurred here is morally reprehensible and it is criminal.’

Ms O’Neil grew emotional as she spoke, her voice wavering and her eyes welling with rage and sadness at what Australian women may suffer.

‘I want the scumbags behind this attack to know that the smartest and toughest people in this country are coming after you,’ she declared.

The cybersecurity minister said Medicare would step in to help affected Australians replace their documents and give them whatever support they needed.

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil has given an impassioned speech to parliament vowing to track down and and punish the ‘scumbag’ Medibank hackers

She said she spoke with Medibank chief executive David Koczkar twice on Thursday to ‘make clear’ community expectations.

‘I don’t want Australians to have to circulate 14 government departments or areas of Medibank in order to get what they deserve and need,’ she said.

‘I received the assurance from Medibank today that if a large data dump occurs, they are fully ready to provide services when and if they are needed to Australians who need them.’

Former cybersecurity minister Karen Andrews then asked a follow up question asking what practical steps the government was taking ‘as opposed to just expressing sympathy’

Ms O’Neil responded by tearing into her predecessor for trying to score political points out of such a serious situation.

‘It is so regrettable that at a moment like this, the opposition wants to politicise the pain and suffering of Australians,’ she replied.

‘I am genuinely shocked. I have been a member of parliament for nine years and usually in moments like this, we have a rare time to come together as a parliament to help people. 

‘I just cannot believe that people who are suffering, who have had personal information about them revealed, that you are trying to politicise this. I am just genuinely shocked.’

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Ms O’Neil warned the leak would likely get worse and during Question Time on Thursday acknowledged ‘those fears have been realised’

Ms O’Neil then got personal with Ms Andrews, lashing her record as a minister under former prime minister Scott Morrison and accusing her of making the leak worse.

‘This is an incredibly embarrassing question from someone who was the minister for cyber security five months ago. This problem did not begin on May 22,’ she said.

‘I would say to those opposite, as I have said repeatedly, we are about five years behind where we need to be on cyber security. 

‘Do you know who where the ministers over the previous five years? It was the minister for home affairs and it was the person who sits on the opposition leader’s chair (Peter Dutton was minister before Ms Andrews).

‘We would like to collaborate with those opposite to fix what is an urgent national problem that is impart their creation.’

Ms O’Neil invited the opposition to help fight to improve Australia ‘whenever they are ready to stop shamelessly politicising every issue in this parliament’ as they had done for the past decade.

The ransomware group began releasing Medibank data on the dark web in the early hours of Wednesday morning under files named ‘good-list’ and ‘naughty-list’.

The first wave included names, birthdates, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers, health claims information, Medicare numbers for Medibank’s AHM customers and passport numbers for international student clients.

Some of the data is understood to contain the identities of women who had abortions, fetal anomalies, and miscarriages.

The abortion list also include those who suffered ectopic pregnancies where the embryo grows outside the womb and must be terminated to save the mother.

Health insurance codes for cocaine addicts and mental health sufferers were also claimed to be part of the stolen data.

Mr Koczjar said the release of data was disgraceful.

‘The weaponisation of people’s private information in an effort to extort payment is malicious, and it is an attack on the most vulnerable members of our community,’ he said.

‘These are real people behind this data and the misuse of their data is deplorable and may discourage them from seeking medical care.’

Australian Federal Police are ramping up efforts to catch those behind the huge data breach and are co-ordinating with state and territory police to support people at risk of identity fraud.

Operation Guardian, which was set up to tackle the recent Optus hack, is being expanded to investigate the Medibank data theft.

‘If members of the community feel they are at imminent risk they should contact triple zero immediately,’ AFP Assistant Commissioner for Cyber Command Justine Gough said.

Medibank has confirmed details of almost 500,000 health claims have been stolen, along with personal information, after the unnamed group hacked into its system weeks ago.

No credit card or banking details were accessed.