Ministry: Enough resources to deal with leak of 46m users' data

The Communications and Multimedia Ministry has a sufficient team of experts and tools in place for the public to verify if their personal data has been breached or compromised, Deputy Communications and Multimedia Minister Jailani Johari said today.

He said the public should refer to the ministry’s agencies such as the Personal Data Protection Department (PDPD) if they realise that their private information has been leaked.

“We have an agency called the Personal Data Protection Department, which highlights the guidelines for the data subject, that is the data user, and another, the service provider,” he told reporters after launching the World Access and Interconnect Forum 2017 in Kuala Lumpur today.

“The main responsibility of the PDPD is to enforce and regulate personal data protection in Malaysia, and it focuses on the processing of personal data in commercial transactions and on preventing the misuse of personal data.”

Jailani (photo) said this when asked whether the government would set up an official portal to help Malaysians check if their personal information had been leaked online, similar to the sayakenahack.com verification website created by local tech blogger, Keith Rozario.

According to a news article, the website sayakenahack.com was created recently by Rozario to enable the public to check if their personal data is among the information that was stolen. It was reported that more than 46 million mobile users’ data in Malaysia had been leaked since 2014.

However, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) later blocked the website.

Jailani said apart from PDPD, the MCMC as the nation’s internet regulator and the ministry’s website for news verification, sebenarnya.my, were sufficient to address cyber security concerns.

On the World Access and Interconnect Forum 2017, he said that it brought together industry experts and academics to share knowledge on the subject of access and interconnection and it also provided another opportunity for discussions on technology, entrepreneurship and business.

He hoped the forum would strengthen the industry in Malaysia, Asean and globally.

- Bernama