When Hackers Get Better Customer Service Than Customers
The headline grabbed me immediately: “Hacker Finally Makes Contact With Qantas After Being on Hold for 72 Hours.” It’s satirical, of course, but bloody hell if it doesn’t capture something fundamentally broken about how our major corporations treat both security and customer service.
The joke writes itself, doesn’t it? Here’s someone who’s supposedly breached one of Australia’s most recognisable companies, and even they can’t get through to customer service. It’s dark comedy at its finest, but it also highlights a serious problem that’s been festering for years.
The recent Qantas data breach affected nearly 10 million customers, and the response from the company has been about as impressive as you’d expect from an organisation that’s perfected the art of corporate non-accountability. A quick “oops, sorry about that” and then back to business as usual. Meanwhile, customers are left dealing with the fallout – spam calls, potential identity theft, and the massive hassle of changing phone numbers and updating accounts everywhere.
Reading through the discussions about this incident, what strikes me is how many people are calling for stronger privacy laws similar to Europe’s GDPR. The logic is sound: when the fines are less than what it costs to implement proper security controls, companies will naturally choose the cheaper option. It’s basic economics, just with our personal data as the commodity being traded.
But here’s what really gets under my skin – the complete disconnect between how these companies treat security versus customer service. They’ll spend millions on executive bonuses and marketing campaigns, but ask them to invest in proper cybersecurity infrastructure or enough call centre staff to handle customer inquiries? Suddenly the budget gets tight.
The timing of this satirical headline couldn’t be more perfect. Just last month, I had my own delightful experience trying to resolve a simple booking issue with another major Australian airline. Three hours on hold, transferred between five different departments, and ultimately told to “try calling back tomorrow” because their system was down. The irony wasn’t lost on me that I could probably have hacked their website faster than getting through to a human.
This isn’t just about one company, though. It’s symptomatic of a broader problem in how we’ve allowed essential services to be run into the ground in the name of efficiency and shareholder returns. When Qantas was privatised, we were promised competition would drive better service. Instead, we got a duopoly that’s mastered the art of providing the minimum viable product while maximising profits.
The real kicker is that we, as taxpayers, end up bailing these companies out when things go sideways. Remember the COVID-19 subsidies? Qantas received $2.7 billion in government support while simultaneously making thousands of workers redundant and treating customers like inconveniences. Now they can’t even keep our personal data secure.
What frustrates me most is the learned helplessness we’ve all developed. Someone in the discussion mentioned that their “expectations of customer service are dead, buried and living their next life.” That’s exactly where they want us – so worn down by terrible service that we stop expecting better.
The solution isn’t just about privacy laws, though they’d certainly help. We need a fundamental shift in how we hold these companies accountable. The current Privacy Act penalties were increased a few years ago, but as one person noted, the government hasn’t actually prosecuted anyone yet. Laws without enforcement are just suggestions.
More importantly, we need to stop treating data breaches as inevitable technical hiccups and start seeing them for what they really are: failures of corporate responsibility. When a company can’t protect customer data and can’t provide basic customer service, maybe it’s time to question whether they deserve to operate at all.
The satirical headline about the hacker getting better service than customers might be funny, but it’s also a damning indictment of where we’ve ended up. We’ve created a system where even cybercriminals have higher expectations than paying customers. That’s not just poor customer service – it’s a complete breakdown of the social contract between corporations and the communities they’re supposed to serve.