The federal government has risked national security, put cabinet-sensitive material at risk and ignored the advice of Australia's cyber defence agency by using WhatsApp, according to Labor legal affairs spokesman Mark Dreyfus.
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Fairfax Media revealed on Wednesday Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and his cabinet ministers were using the third-party messaging program to conduct confidential discussions, while private chat "groups" exist for government chiefs of staff, ministerial media advisers, the frontline economic team, and a defence-focused "broadcast group" used by Defence Industry Minister Christopher Pyne.
Cyber Security Minister Dan Tehan defended the practice and said the federal government took online security "incredibly seriously" - but declined to say if Defence's cyber agency, the Australian Signals Directorate, had approved the use of WhatsaApp and other third-party messaging programs for cabinet-level communications.
The ASD evaluates and publishes lists of secure "Evaluated Products" and "Certified Cloud Services". WhatsApp and other third party communications apps do not appear on these lists, whereas Apple's iOS operating system and Blackberry's operating system do.
For a second consecutive day, ASD and Defence declined to respond to Fairfax Media's questions about the security of WhatsApp.
But in comments that will add to pressure for government to be more transparent about its use of third-party apps, Mr Dreyfus said it was "shocking to discover the government would go so far as to endanger national security".
"Whatsapp is an unsecure service, which is not on the list of services approved by the Australian Signals Directorate. The government knows this," he said.
"This government is either wilfully putting cabinet-sensitive material at risk, or it is so arrogant that it hasn't even bothered to check that what it is doing is safe and secure."
Four cyber experts told Fairfax Media on Wednesday there were serious security concerns about cabinet ministers using WhatsApp and that it should not be happening.
Mr Tehan and cabinet minister Steve Ciobo insisted the Turnbull government ministry took cyber security seriously and played down the significance of any security risk.
"I'm not going to go into detail into what our intelligence community may or may not say about anything, that is an area we do not comment on," he said.
"Cabinet minister, ministers, members of Parliament take their personal security and their security online very seriously."
"I am not aware that anyone has done anything wrong by the way they are using information technology at the moment . . . I'm supremely confident that cabinet ministers and other ministers and members of Parliament understand the importance of communicating in a secure way."
Mr Ciobo said he had not used WhatsApp for confidential cabinet discussions.
"The fact is that comments are made, conversations are had on WhatsApp that are not confidential. Conversations are effectively coordinating a discussion only, and there's no classified discussions taking place on WhatsApp."
Australian Information Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim confirmed Australia's Freedom of Information laws applied to an "'official document of a minister', regardless of the way it is stored, for example through an app, or whether it has been transmitted via a government or non-government server".
And he said that "every person has a legally enforceable right to obtain access to an 'official document of a minister', other than an exempt document".
"Official documents are those documents held by the minister, in their capacity as a minister, that relate to the affairs of an agency or department. The FOI Act does not apply to a minister's personal documents, documents of a party political nature, or documents held in the minister's capacity as a local member of Parliament. The FOI Act also does not apply to a person who is no longer a minister."
