After ‘Comeleak,’ De Lima urges guidelines vs identity theft

Senatorial candidate former Justice Sec. Leila De Lima
INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / NINO JESUS ORBETA

Senatorial candidate and former Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said government agencies and the electorate should stop pointing fingers on the recent Commission on Elections (Comelec) data leak affecting 55 million registered voters.

De Lima said concerned agencies should instead focus on protecting voters’ personal data by coming up with necessary guidelines.

READ: LOOK: Comelec website hacked

“We all know on whose lap falls the responsibility of securing the voters data. It is no longer productive to finger-point at this time,” De Lima said in a statement on Thursday.

De Lima said the Comelec, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) and other concerned agencies should provide guidelines so the voting public could protect themselves from identity theft.

READ: Dismissing data breach shows Comelec insincerity on polls

The recent breach caused personal information of voters, such as address and mother’s maiden name, to be made available online.

“Government agencies, such as the NBI (National Bureau of Investigation) and the ICT (Information and Communications Technology) Office of the DOST, should now come up with guidelines to prevent identity theft case,” De Lima said.

“They (Comelec) must be subjected to investigation by the NBI and Ombudsman in order to determine the extent of damage,” she added.

De Lima expressed alarm that a mishandling of the situation may affect the public’s perception on the integrity of the upcoming May national polls, as she urged the Comelec to safeguard voters’ data.

READ: DOJ chief assures integrity of polls but mum on safety of voters

“There’s a need to evaluate our current Information Technology (IT) encryption system. The reliability of our government is at stake because of this breach and we need to be able to prevent future database leakages,” De Lima said. RAM