Commissioner of the Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GL&SC), Trevor Benn says that he is being plagued by cyberattacks, as attempts to illegally retrieve data from the Commission have increased for this year.
During a news conference this morning in the Capital, Benn told media operatives that cyber-related incidents are putting strain on the Commission. This challenge, he said, is one of the few facing the Commission.
“There has been an increase in cyber-related incidents at the Commission primarily, email-phishing and spoofing have proven to be irritants. The Commission continues to work closely with its email host and cyber security specialist from the National Data Management Authority to mitigate these issues,” Benn said.
The commissioner confirmed that no sensitive information has been accessed through these “attacks”, but noted that he is being targeted daily. If these attempts are successful, Benn warns that the Commission might be compromised.
“No, they have not so far been able to get their hands on sensitive information. But the cyber-attack, especially on me, is daily,” he said.
Benn assured that steps are being taken to strengthen the barriers protecting the data and network security.
GLSC’s Information System Manager, David Cole, in explaining the nature of the attacks said, “They are via phishing or spoofing – which are email-oriented efforts where someone sends an email asking you to click on something and if you do that, you can compromise your system. So, you download or click on it, and it can do some mischief.”
The IT Manager said that these threats are difficult to eradicate because if someone knows the email address of the intended recipient, there is nothing stopping them from sending an email. The most that can be done on the recipient’s part is to block the sender.
Cole said that one attempt was so serious that the GLSC had no choice but to report it to the police. He said that access was obtained through the Private Branch Exchange (PBX), which according to Imperva.com, is a private telephone network used within a company or organization. The users of the PBX phone system can communicate internally (within their company) and externally (with the outside world).
“We felt that it was serious enough to make a formal report to the police. There was no compromise of data. It was able to use our PBX telephone systems and try to utilise that network…We were informed by the telecommunications company about it, and made a formal report,” Cole said.
