00:00In December last year, Noosa Council says it was the victim of a major fraud incident
00:08in which $2.3 million was stolen.
00:12The council says they've been able to get back around $400,000 of that, but has released
00:18very few details into how this incident occurred.
00:23The council says it was targeted by an international crime gang using what it describes as social
00:29engineering AI.
00:31Now, the ABC has looked into that and that's commonly used to describe incidents like the
00:36use of deep fake video and audio, although the council hasn't confirmed this is the case.
00:43Now, they say that's because they've been advised not to advertise the tactics used by
00:48this crime gang and also to protect those council staff members who were involved in
00:54this incident.
00:55Now, the council says this was entirely ratepayers' money and didn't come from personal accounts
01:00and that this was also not a cyber security breach and therefore no data was stolen.
01:06Now, the other interesting thing about this incident is that it has been 10 months since
01:10it happened and we're only learning about it this week.
01:12Now, the council says that's because this is currently under investigation by domestic
01:18agencies and Interpol and they're advised by them not to go public with this information,
01:25which could potentially compromise that investigation.
01:28Now, so far the police say that they've resolved that no council staff members were willingly involved
01:36in this and the council says they're satisfied that none of their staff members were at fault
01:41as part of this breach.
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