Paramedics caught up in ‘appalling’ privacy breach

The drug and alcohol test results of Ambulance Victoria paramedics were made publicly available for all staff to view in a major privacy breach.

The pre-employment testing results of graduate paramedics in 2017 and 2018 were available on the staff intranet until this week, when the union alerted Ambulance Victoria they were there. It’s not known how long they’d been publicly accessible.

Ambulance union secretary Danny Hill says it’s the result of “sheer incompetence” and hundreds of paramedics may be impacted.

Press PLAY below to hear what the ambulance union boss had to say about the “massive, massive” privacy breach

“Absolutely I think there will be legal ramifications … it’s just a massive, massive systemic breach of the most basics of privacy,” he told Tony Jones, filling in for Neil Mitchell.

In a statement, Ambulance Victoria said the documents were not directly accessible to anyone outside the organisation and an “access audit” is underway.

“We take privacy very seriously and acknowledge the distress that this may cause. Those affected are being notified and will be provided wellbeing support,” the statement read.