system In March 2020, during the Australian coronavirus pandemic, the government's digital welfare platform, MyGov, experienced an outage as thousands of people were logging on to register for welfare services. Robert claimed in a press conference that it was not due to the large number of people who are unemployed and trying to log into MyGov to register for Centrelink, but was due to a DDoS attack. “MyGov has not been offline, it’s simply suffered from a distributed denial of service attack this morning,” he said. Later he corrected the claim following further advice, with commentators incredulous that the Minister had said "my bad" during the retraction. Business connection with Cryo Australia In October 2018, a newspaper revealed Robert had joined a business selling cryotherapy devices. The business founder, was a convicted rapist who at the time was before Queensland’s highest court on appeal against the conviction. Robert said he did not realise the background of the company’s founder until contacted by the media. Robert resigned his director's position after two and a half weeks. Cryo Australia was liquidated shortly thereafter and Robert reportedly lost a huge sum of money. ARC grants vetoed In the 2021 round, for projects to begin in 2022, the research grant fund ARC approved nearly 600 grants. Stuart Robert, as acting education minister, vetoed six grants in the humanities as, in his own view, failing the national interest tests for the grant. He was criticised by academics and politicians for interference with expert evaluation, adelay in making his decision, and announcing it "under cover" of Christmas Eve. Personal life Robert has been married since 1996 to his wife Chantelle and has three sons. References External links - Stuart Robert's political website 1970 births Living people Liberal Party of Australia members of the Parliament of Australia Liberal National Party of Queensland members of the Parliament of Australia Members of the Australian House of Representatives for Fadden Members of the Australian House of Representatives Queensland University of Technology alumni University of New South Wales alumni Government ministers of Australia Australian Army officers Graduates of the Australian Defence Force Academy Royal Military College, Duntroon graduates Abbott Government Turnbull Government 21st-century Australian politicians Morrison Government Australian Pentecostals