The Department of Science and Technology (DOST) lately suffered a comparatively massive cyberattack, however its affect to the group was not intensive, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) stated Thursday.
In a media briefing, DICT Assistant Secretary Renato Paraiso downplayed considerations relating to the incident, a day after DOST Secretary Renato Solidum stated his workplace was treating the information breach with “utmost seriousness.”
“In terms of size, this is recently one of the biggest. But we have to understand, comparatively, the impact of it, hindi siya ganon kalaki (it’s not that big),” Paraiso stated.
The DOST had reported Wednesday that just about two terabytes of its knowledge was compromised by native hackers.
According to Paraiso, the compromised knowledge embody the private data of scientists, members of the DOST group, in addition to the schematics and designs of invention tasks, a few of that are ongoing.
“DOST has been here for so long that, you know, ‘yung mga designs na—, ‘yung iba obsolete na, or ‘yung iba hindi naman nila in-approve, sinubmit lang sa kanila through emails, videos, and what have you,” he stated.
(DOST has been right here for therefore lengthy that, you realize, a few of the designs are already out of date or they weren’t permitted and have been solely submitted by way of emails, movies, and what have you ever.)
Paraiso later stated that some knowledge concerned ongoing tasks, however authorities nonetheless want to find out the extent of the knowledge breach.
He added that whereas the DOST was locked out of their system, no knowledge was extracted.
“Right now ang nakikita namin, naka-locked out lang po. Walang extraction na ginawa ho,” Paraiso stated.
(Right now, we see that we have been solely locked out. No extraction befell.)
No calls for
Meanwhile, Paraiso stated the DICT can not conclude that this was a ransomware assault.
He defined that in such assaults, knowledge is encrypted to stop entry and that hackers would later demand one thing in change for the encryption key.
“But because wala pa pong ransom or demand na ginagawa po, hindi natin—, we cannot conclude that this is a ransomware attack po. Unlike when it happened with PhilHealth na meron kaagad demand,” Paraiso said.
(Because there is still no ransom or demand, we cannot conclude that this is a ransomware attack. Unlike when it happened with PhilHealth, a demand was immediately made.”
“Ang una nga hong mensahe kaagad ng threat actors natin ay somewhat ‘political” in nature. So ganoon ho ‘yung tinitignan din namin. So hindi namin dini-discount ‘yung truth na it’s both a part of activism or one thing extra nefarious,” he added.
(The first message of our threat actors was somewhat ‘political’ in nature. So we are also looking into that. We are not discounting that it’s either part of activism or something more nefarious.)
Partial access
According to Paraiso, the DOST has regained partial access to its system.
He said the technical team still needs to gain access to the full system in order to do a deep investigation on what happened and the extent of the damage.
“We would take as a lot time as doable to realize entry to the methods and to do our investigation naman. Again, hindi na ho lalala yung problema as a result of we already employed remediation processes,” he said.
“The affected methods have been already remoted, the endpoints have been quarantined na po, the WiFi have been separated. So ang ginagawa na lang namin ay kukunin yung entry at magsasagawa ng imbestigasyon sa nangyari,” he added.
In a latest interview with GMA News Online, Paraiso stated ICT methods turn into susceptible usually as a result of some expertise or firmware might already be outdated.
He stated the federal government procurement course of might take a very long time, whereas expertise might change at a quick tempo. — VDV, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
