Reports the Optus hacker has withdrawn the threat to release more personal data onto the web is cold comfort for the more than 10,000 people whose information was dumped.
It is also of little consolation to the almost 10 million who only have the hacker's word the datasets have been destroyed.
Their identities have been compromised. The only way they can protect themselves is to reset passwords, and to obtain new documents including drivers licences, passports and Medicare cards and numbers and the like, ad infinitum. This is the result of the failure by Optus to protect the data it has harvested from customers.
The biggest lesson is that everybody, whoever and wherever they are, is vulnerable to having their identity compromised as a result of a "data grab culture" within big business and big government.
While Optus has rejected claims by Home Affairs Minister Claire O'Neil it had "left the window open" and fallen victim to "quite a basic hack", neither she nor many of the affected customers are buying that.
Ms O'Neil, whose office was also slow to react with her first formal statement only posted on Tuesday, has even gone so far as to urge consumers to follow developments in regard to a possible class action.
She highlighted the fact that while such a data breach would have resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in fines if it had occurred overseas, the maximum penalty for breaches under the Privacy Act here is capped at just over $2 million; an amount that appears to be manifestly inadequate given the scale of disruption this has caused.
Affecting, as it does, almost half Australia's adult population, the data breach is a bitter pill for millions of people to swallow.
In addition to highlighting the failure of major corporations to adequately protect data that has, in some cases, been harvested without the knowledge of the people concerned, it has also exposed how difficult it is for individuals to protect themselves after a data breach has occurred given drivers licence numbers are far from simple to change in most jurisdictions.
The failure by governments and corporate Australia to adapt to the 21st century's ever-evolving cyber-security threats has left everybody exposed and vulnerable.
It's not good enough for the Minister to just put the boot into Optus and move on. Ms O'Neil has to take action to ensure this cannot happen again.
ISSUE: 39,716
WHAT DO YOU THINK? We've made it a whole lot easier for you to have your say. Our new comment platform requires only one log-in to access articles and to join the discussion on the Newcastle Herald website. Find out how to register so you can enjoy civil, friendly and engaging discussions. Sign up for a subscription here.
