Thank you for contacting the Freedom of Information (FOI) team at the
Attorney-General’s Department (the department). We get a high volume of
emails and FOI applications and work to respond as promptly as possible.
This auto-reply email confirms your email has been delivered to the
[AGD request email] mailbox. If you have written to the department to submit an
FOI request, please consider this email to be an acknowledgement of its
receipt.
Please note that we will only respond to emails about the Freedom of
Information Act 1982 (the FOI Act). For information on how to make a
request under the FOI Act please refer to:
https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect....
For enquiries about other matters, please refer to:
https://www.ag.gov.au/about-us/connect-u....
The statutory processing time for FOI requests is 30 days, however this
may be extended if the department needs to consult third parties or for
other reasons. If you have submitted an FOI request, the department will
write to you again within 30 days of receiving your request. This
correspondence may:
* provide assistance to you to help you make a valid FOI request,
* seek further information from you to help us process your request,
* provide you with a decision on your FOI request, or
* discuss whether an extension of time is needed to process your request.
Please do not send duplicate emails as this may cause delays to processing
times.
This FOI inbox is monitored during business hours Monday to Friday,
excluding public holidays.
You can expect our team to provide a helpful, respectful service and we
expect respectful engagement in return.
Under s 89L of the FOI Act, disrespectful, threatening or abusive language
may be an abuse of the access action process. If this happens, we may not
be able to help you or we might take steps to manage how we communicate
with you.
If you have received this transmission in error please notify us
immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any
attachments have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute
waiver of any confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of
information in the e-mail or attachments.
If you have received this transmission in error please notify us
immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any
attachments have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute
waiver of any confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of
information in the e-mail or attachments.

Good morning Mr Hollingworth

Thank you for your FOI request which was received by the Attorney-General's Department on 2 September 2025.

In order for a request to be valid under s 15(2)(b) of the FOI Act, we require such information concerning the document as is reasonably necessary to enable a responsible officer of the agency to identify it. We are not able to process requests for information or requests for research to be undertaken by officers of the department.

In order to assist you to make a valid request, we invite you to revise your request by specifying the documents to which you are seeking access. Noting the terms of your original request, we suggest the following revision:

"Advice or briefing material provided by the Attorney-General's Department to the Attorney-General's Office in relation to the use of AI bots potentially being used by foreign actors to create an overload of anonymous or vexatious FOI requests."

Please let us know if you agree to this revision of your request, or whether you wish to provide an alternative revision of scope.

Kind regards

Freedom of Information & Privacy
Attorney-General’s Department
Phone: (02) 6141 6666 | Email: [AGD request email]

show quoted sections

Thank you for contacting the Freedom of Information (FOI) team at the
Attorney-General’s Department (the department). We get a high volume of
emails and FOI applications and work to respond as promptly as possible.
This auto-reply email confirms your email has been delivered to the
[AGD request email] mailbox. If you have written to the department to submit an
FOI request, please consider this email to be an acknowledgement of its
receipt.
Please note that we will only respond to emails about the Freedom of
Information Act 1982 (the FOI Act). For information on how to make a
request under the FOI Act please refer to:
https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect....
For enquiries about other matters, please refer to:
https://www.ag.gov.au/about-us/connect-u....
The statutory processing time for FOI requests is 30 days, however this
may be extended if the department needs to consult third parties or for
other reasons. If you have submitted an FOI request, the department will
write to you again within 30 days of receiving your request. This
correspondence may:
* provide assistance to you to help you make a valid FOI request,
* seek further information from you to help us process your request,
* provide you with a decision on your FOI request, or
* discuss whether an extension of time is needed to process your request.
Please do not send duplicate emails as this may cause delays to processing
times.
This FOI inbox is monitored during business hours Monday to Friday,
excluding public holidays.
You can expect our team to provide a helpful, respectful service and we
expect respectful engagement in return.
Under s 89L of the FOI Act, disrespectful, threatening or abusive language
may be an abuse of the access action process. If this happens, we may not
be able to help you or we might take steps to manage how we communicate
with you.
If you have received this transmission in error please notify us
immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any
attachments have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute
waiver of any confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of
information in the e-mail or attachments.
If you have received this transmission in error please notify us
immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any
attachments have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute
waiver of any confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of
information in the e-mail or attachments.

OFFICIAL

Good afternoon Mr Hollingworth

Thank you for your FOI request to the Attorney-General’s Department (the
department).

We write to acknowledge your request and seek your agreement to exclude
certain information from your request.

Your request

Your request is for:

Advice or briefing material provided by the Attorney-General's Department
to the Attorney-General's Office in relation to the use of AI bots
potentially being used by foreign actors to create an overload of
anonymous or vexatious FOI requests.

We received your FOI request on 2 September 2025 and the 30 day statutory
period for processing your request commenced from the following day. A
decision is therefore due by 2 October 2025. However this may be extended
under the FOI Act if consultation with third parties are required or for
other reasons. We will advise you if this applies.

Request to exclude certain information from the scope of your request

The department seeks your agreement to exclude the following categories of
information from the documents in your request:

duplicates of documents that are in scope,

personal information of members of the public,

contact details for teams, internal to the department and other agencies,
and

personal information belonging to officers of the department and other
government agencies (such as names, email addresses and telephone
numbers).

Excluding the information listed above enables us to process your request
more efficiently. If you agree to the above exclusions, the names of
senior executive officers will be released where they are present in the
documents and do not otherwise attract an FOI exemption. In addition,
publicly available telephone numbers and email addresses will generally be
released.

Please note that, with some exceptions (such as personal information),
documents released under the FOI Act may later be published online on the
department's disclosure log at
[1]http://www.ag.gov.au/RightsAndProtection....

Next steps

Please respond to this email by 18 September 2025 to confirm whether you
agree the exclusion of the above information.

If you would like to discuss this further please contact the FOI Team by
phoning (02) 6141 6666 or emailing [2][AGD request email].

Kind regards

Freedom of Information & Privacy

Attorney-General’s Department

Phone: (02) 6141 6666 | Email: [3][AGD request email]

OFFICIAL
The Attorney-General’s Department may collect your personal information
where it is reasonably necessary for, or directly related to, our
functions, including those under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (FOI
Act) and the Privacy Act 1988. We may collect your name, email address and
telephone number so that we can contact you about your request or privacy
complaint. If your request concerns accessing or correcting your personal
information, we will collect the minimum amount of evidence necessary to
verify your identity. We hold personal information in accordance with the
Privacy Act and our privacy policy. If you have an enquiry or complaint
about your privacy, please contact the Privacy Officer on 02 6141 6666 or
via e-mail [email address]. 
If you have received this email in error, please notify us immediately by
return email and delete all copies. If this email or any attachments have
been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute waiver of any
confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of information in the
email or attachments.

References

Visible links
1. http://www.ag.gov.au/RightsAndProtection...
2. mailto:[AGD request email]
3. mailto:[AGD request email]

OFFICIAL

Dear Mr Hollingworth

Thank you for your agreement to the exclusions. The department continues
to process your request and has identified several draft documents, where
the relevant text in scope of your request is the same.

We are therefore seeking your agreement to exclude drafts. I would be
grateful for your agreement as soon as possible to avoid any delays in the
processing of your request.

If you would like to discuss this further please contact the FOI Team by
phoning (02) 6141 6666 or emailing [1][AGD request email].

Kind regards

Freedom of Information & Privacy

Attorney-General’s Department

Phone: (02) 6141 6666 | Email: [2][AGD request email]

show quoted sections

OFFICIAL

Dear Mr Hollingworth

The department has identified it requires further time to deal with your
request under s 15AB of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth) as your
request is one of a number of requests the department is concurrently
processing with overlapping scope and the work is complex and voluminous.
The requests all relate to FOI reform and the department does not wish to
combine these requests for the purposes of a practical refusal. Additional
time will allow the department to process your request and provide the
decision to you.

We have identified over 2,300 documents as potentially relevant to one or
more requests and this has created a voluminous amount of documents to
process. Where possible, we have engaged on scope consultation for
specific requests however there are still over 200 documents that are
required to be reviewed for scope, and assessed and marked up with
proposed redactions if necessary. Courtesy consultations will be required
for various Commonwealth agencies to inform the decision maker’s decision
on access. Sensitivities identified within the documents include legal
professional privilege (s 42) and Cabinet material (s 34).

Further, the area of the department primarily responsible for identifying,
reviewing and deciding on the documents’ relevance to the requests
continues to be heavily engaged in the FOI reform work which has generated
these requests, and this work cannot be deferred or designated to other
staff.

On this basis we have requested a 30 day extension for your request
(FOI25/403) submitted on 2 September 2025 which is a request for documents
in relation to the AI bots potentially used by foreign actors creating an
overload of anonymous and vexatious FOI requests as described by the
Attorney-General and Mark Butler.

The OAIC may contact you in relation to this extension request (OAIC ref
RQ25/05902). A decision maker at the OAIC will take any comments you may
have to make into account when deciding on our application.

We are continuing to progress your request and working towards providing
your decision by the requested extension date.

We expect the OAIC will notify you of their decision on our extension of
time request in due course.

Joanna Baker

Assistant Director

Freedom of Information and Privacy Section
Attorney-General’s Department

T: (02) 6141 6666 | E: [1][AGD request email]

For information on how to make an FOI Request see
[2]https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect...

OFFICIAL

The Attorney-General’s Department may collect your personal information
where it is reasonably necessary for, or directly related to, our
functions, including those under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (FOI
Act) and the Privacy Act 1988. We may collect your name, email address and
telephone number so that we can contact you about your request or privacy
complaint. If your request concerns accessing or correcting your personal
information, we will collect the minimum amount of evidence necessary to
verify your identity. We hold personal information in accordance with the
Privacy Act and our privacy policy. If you have an enquiry or complaint
about your privacy, please contact the Privacy Officer on 02 6141 6666 or
via e-mail [email address]. 
If you have received this email in error, please notify us immediately by
return email and delete all copies. If this email or any attachments have
been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute waiver of any
confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of information in the
email or attachments.

References

Visible links
1. mailto:[AGD request email]
2. https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect...

Our reference: RQ25/05902

Agency reference: FOI25/403

Agency name: Attorney-General's Department
By Email: [AGD request email]

Applicant Name: David Hollingworth
By Email: [FOI #13572 email]

Extension of time under s 15AB

Dear Parties,

Please find attached an extension of time decision relating to the above
referenced FOI request.

Kind regards,

[1][IMG]   Melih Sayan

Assistant Review Advisor

Office of the Australian Information Commissioner

Sydney NSW | GPO Box 5288 Sydney NSW 2001

P 1300 363 992 E [2][email address]

Notice:

The information contained in this email message and any attached files may
be confidential information, and may also be the subject of legal
professional privilege. If you are not the intended recipient any use,
disclosure or copying of this email is unauthorised. If you received this
email in error, please notify the sender by contacting the department's
switchboard on 1300 488 064 during business hours (8:30am - 5pm Canberra
time) and delete all copies of this transmission together with any
attachments.

References

Visible links
1. https://www.oaic.gov.au/
2. mailto:[email address]

OFFICIAL

Dear Mr Hollingworth

The OAIC will have written to you to advise they have declined the
extension of time for your request. The decision for your request was due
yesterday and the decision is now ‘deemed’ as we were unable to finalise
the request by this date.

We are working to finalise your request and provide a decision to you as
soon as possible and no later than 3 November 2025.

We will be seeking a s15AC extension of time from the OAIC to enable the
decision to be made within the statutory timeframe and preserve your right
to an internal review of the department’s decision. The extension
application will not delay the processing of your request.

We will provide you with an update when we apply for the extension of time
as the OAIC may contact you in relation to this extension request. A
decision maker at the OAIC will take into account any comments you may
wish to make when deciding whether to grant the extension.

Where the department is granted the extension of time, we are able to
provide a more timely decision for request rather than finalising your
request through an IC Review of the deemed decision.

If you have any questions please contact me at [1][AGD request email] or by
phone 02 6141 6666.

Kind regards

Joanna Baker

Assistant Director

Freedom of Information and Privacy Section
Attorney-General’s Department

T: (02) 6141 6666 | E: [2][AGD request email]

For information on how to make an FOI Request see
[3]https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect...

OFFICIAL

OFFICIAL

OFFICIAL

OFFICIAL

References

Visible links
1. mailto:[AGD request email]
2. mailto:[AGD request email]
3. https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protect...