ON the heels of the hacking of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth), system, its employees union yesterday slammed agency officials for their inability to properly manage the crisis.
In a statement, the PhilHealth-Workers for Hope, Integrity, Transparency and Empowerment (PhilHealth-WHITE) said the actions of their officials are unacceptable as the hacking incident placed the rank-and-file personnel in the line of fire.
“At the end of the day, the lowly paid rank-and-file suffer from the humiliating consequence while the highly-paid executives could not even appraise the employees,” said PhilHealth-WHITE.
“When anxiety had been high, no top officer surfaced to assure the rank-and-file that we are managing the crisis. When questions were raised, employees were left to wait, seen-zoned,” it added.
The group also said the crisis could have been avoided if adequate preparations have been made.
“It reveals the ill-preparedness of the corporation in crisis management. It is not a fortuitous event, but clearly a mishap bound to happen because safeguards were compromised and not prioritized,” the union said.
The employees called for an investigation on who should be held liable.
“We demand accountability. We demand an investigation to rid this corporation of highly paid executives, who cannot do what they are paid to do,” the union said.
Several systems of the state health insurer were hacked and subjected to Medusa ransomware attacks last Friday.
This forced PhilHealth to shut down its entire system while shifting to manual operations on the ground.
PhilHealth has said it would not pay the $300,000 ransom reportedly being demanded by the hackers.
The Department of Information and Communications Technology committed the “full restoration” PhilHealth’s system and to safeguard government systems and infrastructure from malicious cyber threats.
DICT’s Cybersecurity Bureau said it went to the PhilHealth’s head office and implemented critical security measures which included disconnection of workstations from the network, and collection of logs for thorough analysis.
As of September 25, PhilHealth’s critical web services are only accessible via their IP addresses and currently ongoing comprehensive security scanning. Efforts to restore the functionality of PhilHealth’s DNS server are underway, it said. — With Myla Iglesias
Cop behind slaying of 2 Malabon residents, injuring another nabbed
BY VICTOR REYES
A MALABON City policeman tagged as the lone suspect in the killing of two city residents and wounding of another has been arrested by authorities.
The suspect was identified as Patrolman Zenjo Del Rosario, assigned with the Drug Enforcement Unit of the Malabon City police station.
At around 4:30 a.m. last Wednesday, a suspect described as about 30 years old, standing 5-foot-5 and of medium-built, broke into the house of the victims in Barangay Acacia in Malabon. Successive shots were later heard.
The house owner, Alexis Gutierrez, and another occupant of the house, Jay Bacusmo Apas, died in the attack while Baby Tadiamon was injured.
Through the help of closed-circuit television footage in the area and an interview with witnesses, police investigators were able to uncover the suspect’s identity.
The suspect, who was wearing a bull cap and jacket at the time of the attack, was later identified as Del Rosario, police said.
Del Rosario was arrested at 12:50 p.m. last Wednesday by Malabon City operatives. He is currently under the custody of the Malabon City police station.
He will be subjected to a paraffin test and medical examination. His service firearm was confiscated and will be subjected to a ballistic examination.
National Capital Region Police Office director Brig. Gen. Jose Melencio Nartatez ordered a thorough investigation of the case and commended Malabon City policemen for the arrest of the suspect.
“This proves that we will never tolerate police officers abusing their authority. We, as law enforcers, must protect life and uphold the highest respect for it. Therefore, abusive and undeserving ones should be rid of from the ranks,” said Nartatez.
Nartatez also extended his condolences to the bereaved families of Guitierez and Apas and vowed that murder charges would be filed against the erring lawman.
PNP chief Gen. Benjamin Acorda Jr. yesterday said the investigation of the case was continuing.
“I was informed by the regional director of NCRPO (during a) briefing ing yesterday (Wednesday). The investigation is continuing and we are going to file the necessary charges,” said Acorda.
“There are witnesses, all the needed forensic and other scientific forensic investigation that should be done have been already done. So, let’s wait for the filing of charges,” added Acorda.
