Dear Editor,

Since the start of the pandemic buzz phrases such as digital transformation, digitisation, and pivoting to digital platforms have been bandied about as the solution to maintaining a balance between lives and livelihoods. However, as with all things, the economic power that can be wielded with increased digitisation comes with great responsibility — ensuring that sensitive personal information of users remains protected.

The Andrew Holness Administration has, since the outset, expressed the intent to modernise the public sector, in part, through the digitisation of certain manual processes to increase efficiency. If this is ever to be achieved it must be underpinned by a strong underlying cybersecurity infrastructure; one that assures citizens that their information will remain safe from unauthorised access.

In a world in which data has become the most valuable commodity, and hackers’ skill and sophistication increase by the day, cybersecurity has become ever more essential.

Despite the complexity of cybersecurity solutions deployed by governments across the globe, ever so often we read about countries, both rich and poor, becoming the target of concerted actions by sophisticated hackers. A few examples include the recent attempt to attack military-run government websites in Myanmar and Russian attacks on the software used by the US State Department and Department of Homeland Security.

Regardless of the many billions pumped into shoring up cybersecurity by international governments, no system is perfect and malicious parties make it their business to seek out and manipulate tech vulnerabilities to their benefit.

In this context, it would appear that the JamCOVID-19 platform is not the first to be targeted by parties with unclear intentions; and, surely, won’t be the last.

Furthermore, investigations in the matter by Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency (MOCA) showed that the platform was operating under globally accepted ISO (International Organization for Standardization) standards and supported by the same Amazon Web Services platform used by some of the world’s largest corporations, including Netflix, Twitter, the British Broadcasting Corporation, and Samsung.

The Government has assured the public that no information from the JamCOVID-19 program was accessed by unauthorised personnel, nor was it ever at risk of exposure. However, the entire matter has brought a crucial issue to the fore — the importance of the Jamaican Government making significant investments to upgrade the national cybersecurity infrastructure. The success of the proposed national identification system (NIDS) or any other similar initiatives to be implemented by the Government will depend on it.

Stewart McIntosh

St Andrew