AI data leakage in aged care: what leaves when resident records go into ChatGPT or Claude.

Aged care runs on documents about people who cannot easily protect their own information: care plans, progress notes, incident reports, family emails. The Aged Care Act 2024, in force since 1 November 2025, gives every person receiving funded aged care a right to have their personal information protected, and requires registered providers to use and disclose it only for the delivery of their care. This series takes seventeen documents a provider produces every week, marks every item that right covers, and shows where each one goes when the document is pasted into ChatGPT or Claude. Each page ends with the same document on Ermos, inside the service.

The documents, one at a time

RecordThe resident care plan

Diagnoses, medications, behaviours, mobility and the substitute decision-maker. The whole person, on four pages.

See what leaves →
NotesShift handover notes

Several residents, a refusal of care, a family visit, a concern about a colleague. An evening shift, written in a hurry.

See what leaves →
Report or memoThe serious incident report

The resident, the allegation, the worker, the witnesses and what the service got wrong, in a report due within 24 hours.

See what leaves →
EmailThe email to a resident’s family

The fall, the hospital, the medications, a behaviour change and the conversation nobody wants to have, written to a daughter.

See what leaves →
Report or memoThe medication incident report

The resident, the drug, the dose, the nurse who gave it and why the system let it happen.

See what leaves →
LetterThe hospital transfer letter

Diagnoses, medications, the advance care directive and the next of kin, compressed onto one page for the ambulance.

See what leaves →
AgreementThe resident agreement

The accommodation payment, the daily fees, the means assessment and who signs. A resident’s finances, in the contract that admits them.

See what leaves →
EmailThe email to Services Australia

Centrelink identifiers, the pension, the assets, a disputed valuation and the family story behind it, in an email to government.

See what leaves →
LetterThe complaint response

The allegations, the care, the staff involved, the investigation and the admissions, in a letter the Commission may read next.

See what leaves →
RecordThe behaviour support plan

The triggers, the psychotropic, who consented, what was tried first. The record the law requires, about the most vulnerable resident in the home.

See what leaves →
SpreadsheetThe roster and agency workbook

Staff and agency names, leave, screening dates, a worker stood down and which resident needs which staff member. A week on Wattle wing.

See what leaves →
SpreadsheetThe fees and refunds register

Accommodation payments, daily fees, refunds owing to estates, a bank account and who may be phoned. A finance register, one row per resident.

See what leaves →
RecordThe palliative care plan

Prognosis, treatment limits, symptom plan, faith, a disagreement between her children and funeral wishes. The most private page in the file.

See what leaves →
FormThe falls risk assessment

The fall, the medicines, how she thinks and moves, what is in place and a risk score. A post-fall form, one resident.

See what leaves →
FormThe restrictive practice consent form

The medicine, the behaviours, what was tried first, the risks explained, a guardian’s own words and who had the authority to consent.

See what leaves →
TranscriptThe family meeting transcript

Injuries, an allegation against a named worker, an earlier warning, a family’s money and a threat to complain, in the speakers’ own words.

See what leaves →
Text or chat messageThe staff group chat handover

Three days of handover: an allegation against a colleague, injury photos, a dying resident, a shared login and an open police matter.

See what leaves →

How the leakage happens

The mechanism is the same for every document. The whole text is transmitted to the provider’s servers. On personal plans the user cannot choose where it is stored or processed, and for the major providers that has generally meant outside Australia. On consumer tiers it can be retained and used to train future models. The provider’s staff and systems can reach it under the provider’s own policies. Once sent, the service no longer controls it. Our on-premise vs cloud comparison sets out the four ways to run AI and where each one puts your documents.

The obligations in play

Each marked item on these pages links to the guide that covers its obligation:

The same documents on Ermos

Ermos Dominion drafts and searches on a unit in your office, so the documents never leave it. Ermos Edge keeps your documents on your own instance in an Australian data centre and sends only permitted excerpts, per question, to a named Australian provider. Every page in this series ends with both, item by item.

Common questions

Can aged care providers use ChatGPT or Claude with resident information?
Generally not with identifiable resident information, and the privacy regulator advises the same. The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) recommends in its guidance on commercially available AI products that organisations do not enter personal information, and particularly sensitive information, into publicly available generative AI tools, because of the significant and complex privacy risks. Section 168 of the Aged Care Act 2024 requires a registered aged care provider to protect personal information about the people it serves. The section limits use and disclosure to purposes connected with delivering their care, except with consent. The Privacy Act treats health information as sensitive information.
Do ChatGPT and Claude train on what staff paste in?
They can, depending on the plan. As at October 2026, whether a conversation on a personal plan (ChatGPT Free, Plus or Pro; Claude Free, Pro or Max) can be used to train the models depends on a setting each user controls. Business plans (ChatGPT Business and Enterprise, Claude Team and Enterprise) and the developer APIs sit under commercial terms, and OpenAI and Anthropic each say they do not train on that content by default (OpenAI, Anthropic). On either product, the thumbs up and thumbs down buttons can send a whole conversation back for training. Aged care staff paste care plans and progress notes, which hold health information about residents who cannot easily protect it themselves.
Do business plans such as ChatGPT Business or Claude Team solve the problem for aged care providers?
Only in part. A business plan changes the default on training, but it does not change who receives the content. On a personal plan the user cannot choose where conversations are stored or processed. Some business plans let an organisation choose to store data at rest in Australia (OpenAI), which still leaves the content with the AI company. The OAIC's guidance also tells organisations to review carefully the terms and settings that will apply to their use of any AI product. For an aged care service, resident care plans, incident reports and family emails would still reach the AI company. Our comparisons with ChatGPT Enterprise and Claude weigh the trade-offs.
What is the safest way for an aged care service to use AI with resident documents?
Ermos is built so the document stays under your control. On the Dominion AI unit it is drafted inside your office and none of it is sent to an AI provider. On Ermos Edge your documents and index stay on your own instance in an Australian data centre, and only the question and the excerpts the user is permitted to see go to a named Australian provider that is contractually barred from keeping them or training any model on them. In aged care, staying in control means a resident's care plan, incident report or family email is drafted where the service can see it, check it and answer for it.
What does the Aged Care Act 2024 say about residents' information?
Section 23(5) of the Statement of Rights gives an individual the right to have their personal privacy respected and their personal information protected. Section 168 requires a registered provider to ensure the protection of personal information about the people it delivers services to: it must not be used other than for a purpose connected with delivering the service or the purpose for which it was given, and must not be disclosed without consent other than for purposes connected with delivering the service. Section 21 treats personal information, and information whose disclosure could found an action for breach of confidence, as protected information.
Is a care plan health information under the Privacy Act?
Yes. Health information is sensitive information under the Privacy Act, with stricter rules on collection, use and disclosure than ordinary personal information. Most aged care documents are health information, and many also carry financial and family details.
Does this apply to home care as well as residential?
The Act's obligations apply to registered providers delivering funded aged care services, which includes home support and home care as well as residential care. The examples in this series are residential, but the documents, and the obligations, are the same in substance.

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