The Democratic Labour Party says it’s concerned about the security and resilience of Government IT systems from cyber attacks, following a recent attack at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH).
In a statement, Working Group on Health Chairman Paul Gibson, said that the public needed more information on the cyber attack, and systems needed to be much stronger.
“To date, this cybersecurity incident affecting the QEH does not appear to have been resolved, and, and the public has not received comprehensive updates or information from the Minister regarding the scale of the breach, if or what confidential patient records have been accessed or stolen, and what is the timeline for full recovery of the hospital. Furthermore, the Minister, who is essentially the CEO of the hospital, has been on vacation during this time of crisis,” he added.
He is also worried that key government departments’ IT systems are also not resilient to such attacks.
“The DLP is deeply concerned about the security and resilience of the QEH’s IT systems from malicious cyber attacks, and even more concerned about the government’s ability to secure other critical IT systems such as the Digital ID system, TAMIS (Tax Administration), and EZPay+ (government electronic payments), and others.
This also comes on the heels of the Electoral and Boundaries Commission leaking the entire voter’s list on to the public Internet during last years’ elections, and several government departments or functions having been compromised by hackers, including the Royal Barbados Police Force, Supreme Court, Immigration Department, Statistics Department, Office of the Attorney General, One-Year Welcome Stamp website, and many others,” Gibson added. (AL)
