‘Comelec website hacking highlights need for DICT’

MANILA, Philippines – The Aquino administration has been asked to act on the bill creating the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) following the hacking of the Commission on Elections website and release online of voters’ personal information.

Sen. Ralph Recto made the call to prevent hacking of government websites.

He noted that there is no designated guard of the country’s ICT infrastructure in the government.

The Department of Transportation and Communications is not capable of performing the functions of DICT as it cannot even monitor the operations of buses on the roads, according to Recto.

Last year, Congress approved the bill creating the DICT. The Senate has decided to adopt the version of the House of Representatives to facilitate its passage.

However, President Aquino has yet to act on the bill.

Recto, who sponsored the bill in the Senate, said the DICT envisioned by Congress would have a lean bureaucracy and would not entail a big budget as a newly created agency.

He said the DICT would play an important role in ICT development, institutionalizing e-government and managing the country’s ICT environment.

“ICT is the third biggest source of dollars after electronics and remittances from overseas Filipino workers. It is a growth driver. Every 10 percentage points increase in broadband penetration is said to boost the gross domestic product by one percent,” Recto said.

Among the functions of the DICT is the identification and prioritization of all e-government systems and applications.

The DICT is also mandated to formulate policies and initiatives to develop and promote ICT in education and promote consumer rights to reliable broadband service.

It would be tasked to formulate the National Cybersecurity Plan and form the National Computer Emergency Response Team which, Recto said, will serve as “our IT Special Action Forces.”

The DICT would be responsible for international cooperation on intelligence gathering concerning cyber security.

Recto said the DICT should be part of the national security plan in this age when terrorists are resorting to cybercrimes to wreak havoc on a nation.

“An enemy with a missile is as dangerous as one with malware. Countries we are not so friendly with may target us and criminals will always want to hack their way into our financial system,” Recto said.

He cited the $81-million heist done by hackers against the Bank of Bangladesh.

“A poor man’s ATM is vulnerable to hacking too. There are identity thefts victimizing ordinary people,” Recto said.