Baguio data system attacked 3 million times

BAGUIO CITY, Philippines — The Baguio City government’s data system was attacked by cybercriminals over three million times last year, but it survived all of them, according to the Management Information Technology Division (MITD) of the Baguio City Mayor’s Office.

“The attacks started last September, the month when the Medusa ransomware was very active and when a lot of government agencies were also affected,” MITD chief Francisco Camarao said.

“Fortunately, the attacks against our system were unsuccessful as we were defended by our firewall,” Camarao added.

He stressed that attacks occur daily and get more sophisticated, hence, “there is a need to further beef up cybersecurity measures to ensure the protection of the data collated from various transactions in the city government.”

Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong confirmed the vulnerability of the city’s system based on the results of an assessment conducted on it by a third party.

Magalong said failure to protect the database would mean loss of data which, if translated in financial terms, would cost millions of pesos.

“It would also be a big blow to the city’s efforts to painstakingly build its data base meant to speed up the delivery of services,” he added.