Australian companies have been hit with a lot of cyberattacks. This has put the spotlight on the country’s understaffed cybersecurity industry, which experts say seems unprepared to deal with these hacks, putting millions of people’s sensitive information at risk.
Here is a list of companies whose data has been stolen so far this year:
A unit of Singapore Telecommunications, which is Australia’s second-largest mobile operator, was the first to report a data breach that could affect up to 10 million customers, or about 40% of the country’s population. Some of the information that was leaked was home addresses, driver’s licence numbers, and passport numbers.
About one-sixth of Australians are covered by the health insurance company Medibank Private. It said that personal and significant amounts of health claims data for about 9.7 million of its current and former customers were compromised, which caused it to report a hit to earnings and pull its forecast for a key metric.
The biggest grocery store chain in Australia, Woolworths Group Ltd., said that its online store, MyDeal, found that a “compromised user credential” was used to get into its systems. This gave hackers access to the email addresses, phone numbers, and delivery addresses of about 2.2 million customers.
Australian Clinical Laboratories
Australian Clinical Labs Ltd., one of the largest pathology providers in the country, said that its unit Medlab had a breach that put the information of about 223,000 patients at risk.
The largest telecommunications company in Australia, Telstra (OTC:TLSYY), had what it called a “small data breach” that exposed the information of about 30,000 current and former employees dating back to 2017.
IT services consulting firm Dailog, which is part of Singapore Telecommunications, said it was hit by a cyber attack that could affect up to 1,000 current and former employees and fewer than 20 clients.
Assistant Minister for Defense in Australia, Matt Thistlethwaite, said that hackers used ransomware to attack a communications platform used by the military and defence staff of the country but that no data was lost.
BWX Limited, a company that makes skin and hair care products, said that a malicious code was “illegally” put on one of its websites. About 2,500 customers’ credit card numbers and expiration dates could have been seen because of this code.
