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April 17-30, 2016 Vol. XXXIV No. 14
Pasay City - Construction workers watch the long lines of commuters waiting for their buses home to the suburbs during Friday rush hour - a scene that has become far too common for the unfortunate commuting public. Photo by C. Jude Defensor. For more of his interesting snapshots of Philippine life, follow him on Instagram @judefensor
PNP preps cyber-security measures for May 9 elections F
Kidapawan Clash: More deadly than El Niño By VIA BAROMA
By VIA BAROMA
W
ith only a few weeks before the much-awaited national election, the Philippine National Police (PNP) said it has alerted its anti-cybercrime group to provide maximum cyber-security measures for the software and vote-counting machines that would be used for the national and local elections on May 9. This security measures were made following the recent cyber hacking attacks on the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) website last March. The group Anonymous Philippines, which has hacked other government websites in the past, is known to be the one behind the hacking of COMELEC website. Then, shortly after Anonymous Philippines defaced the COMELEC website, anoth-
er group accessed the data of the poll body’s site, posting election-related data online. The hacking attacks raised concerns about the security of the voting process during the automated elections, but the COMELEC assured the public that it would be able to safeguard their votes. “From what I’ve gathered, the system that’s going to be used, to be deployed by COMELEC, is hack-proof,” PNP chief Director General Ricardo Marquez said. “I heard that this technology was used in other countries and even a state-run political exercise wasn’t able to tamper with this technology. But we have alerted our ACG for this eventuality. We will partner with other government agencies for the inclusion of cyber-security as part of our preparations.”
Meanwhile, COMELEC Commissioner Luie Guia stressed the strength of today’s voting process and ensured the public of the maximum-security system of the coming elections. “It's a whole process. There's a procedure to come up with the results in any case because you have paper ballots, you have picture images of the ballot, you have election returns. In other words, you have multiple copies of election results, and it's very hard for anyone to change the results to game the system," the Commissioner said in a Rappler report. Guia added that the COMELEC has also sought the help of the DOST (Department of Science and Technology) and the National Bureau of Investigation to come up with mitigating and strength security page 3 measures.
ollowing the violent clash in Kidapawan that led to the death of three people, composed of two farmers and a bystander, and 140 reportedly injured police, including two that were left in critical condition due to head trauma, the motion to reduce bail for the Kidapawan farmers charged with direct assault remains pending after Municipal Trial Court Judge Rebecca de Leon requested for additional documents from the defense. The bloodshed between the anti-riot police and thousands of drought-hit farmers last April 1 was caused after the farmers protested asking the government for the most basic human need—food. According to a report in Balitanghali, Judge De Leon asked for judicial affidavits from representatives of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), who issued certificates of indigency for the farmers; and requested for medical certificates and judicial affidavits from doctors who examined the farmers. page 4