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NBI releases suspected Comelec hacker’s mugshot


 


The National Bureau of Investigation has identified one of the suspected hackers of the Commission on Elections website as Paul Biteng.

The NBI Anti-Cybercrime Division also released the mugshot of the suspected member of Anonymous Philippines, the group that claimed the recent hacking of the Comelec website.

Biteng was arrested in an NBI operation at his home in Sampaloc, Manila. Initial reports indicate that he is 23 years old.

Comelec chief Andres Bautista and NBI authorities met the suspect on Thursday morning and Bautista said the hacker admitted to defacing the Comelec website.

Authorities said the hacker is a recent graduate of information technology but they refused to reveal which school he is from.

Ronald Aguto, chief of the NBI Cybercrime Division, said it took them about three weeks before this arrest.

He added that they are still looking for two other hackers who are part of the group responsible for the hacking.

While the defacement was claimed by Anonymous Philippines, the NBI Cybercrime Division said the specific affiliation of the hacker is part of an ongoing investigation.

The probe is focused on the data supposedly stolen from Comelec and leaked online.

Aguto said they are also looking into the extent of information that the arrested hacker obtained. At the moment, he could not say whether the data they discovered indeed came from the poll body.

Following Biteng's arrest, hackers took the allegedly stolen Comelec data and re-posted it online as a searchable database on an independent site.

The site was put on the same day the NBI arrested Biteng.

The site allows a user to gain access to a person's basic personal data by just keying in his or her name.

In a statement, Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said the NBI is already investigating what he called the "hacker website."

He called on the public not to use the site.

"In the meantime that [the NBI investigators] have not furnished us a copy of their findings, we advise the public not to use the hacker website as it can be used by the hackers to steal your information and thus expose you even further to the dangers of identity theft," Jimenez said.

"We also cannot rule out at this stage that this may be an attempt by the hackers to monetize the data they claim to have," he added. —NB, GMA News

 

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