DepEd verifying possible data breach among students, teachers

The Department of Education (DepEd) on Wednesday said that it is verifying information that one of its regional offices was allegedly hacked, compromising data of students and teachers.

In a message to reporters, DepEd spokesperson Undersecretary Michael Poa said the agency’s field offices have been ordered to run diagnostics and verify if there was indeed a hacking incident.

“No report as of the moment as verification is ongoing. We will provide information as soon as we get them from our Regional and Division Information Officers,” Poa said.

He also noted that the DepEd is coordinating with the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) regarding the matter. 

 The Education Department has yet to disclose where the concerned regional office is exactly located

DICT spokesperson Assistant Secretary Aboy Paraiso said that they are also still verifying the report.

“[B]ut we can say that we isolated our investigation to a regional office of the DepEd. We will update you within the day if this report is verified and its possible extent,” he told reporters in a Viber message.

Hackers from China?

DICT Undersecretary for Cybersecurity Jeff Ian Dy earlier said that hackers believed to be operating in China breached into the email systems and internal websites of several government agencies that used a cloud service provider, most likely to gather information.

Dy said the cyber-attack, which he described as “academically perfect,” was probably done by one of the three notorious hacking groups: Lonely Island, Meander, and Panda.

“These are believed to be advanced threat groups that operate within the ambit of Chinese territories,” he said.

He also said that the hackers specifically targeted the administrators of the said government agencies’ email domains. After determining the administrators of the email domains, he said the hackers may use the credentials and sensitive information of the administrators "for whatever purpose."

China, in return, has dismissed as “groundless” the allegations that Chinese hackers attempted to breach the email systems and internal websites of several Philippine government agencies.

A spokesperson from the Chinese Embassy said Beijing "firmly opposes and cracks down on all forms of cyber attack in accordance with law, allows no country or individual to engage in cyber attack and other illegal activities on Chinese soil or using Chinese infrastructure."

“Some Filipino officials and media maliciously speculated about and groundlessly accused China of engaging in cyber attacks against the Philippines, even went as far as connecting these cyber attacks with the South China Sea disputes,” the spokesperson countered.

“Such remarks are highly irresponsible,” the spokesperson added. — RSJ, GMA Integrated News