PUTRAJAYA, March 25 — The Economy Ministry will hold a meeting with Sarawak government representatives soon to discuss security measures for the Central Database Hub System (Padu).

Its minister Rafizi Ramli, in a statement today, said the ministry is committed to addressing all questions and concerns raised by the Sarawak government.

"I take note of the press statement by Datuk Sharifah Hasidah Sayeed Aman Ghazali, Deputy Minister in the Sarawak Premier’s Department (Law, MA63 and State-Federal Relations) regarding the implementation of Padu in Sarawak.

"The government will always ensure secure data handling, including system security, network and data protecting personal information,” he said.

According to Rafizi, the information in the Padu system is official government information protected under the Official Secrets Act 1972 [Act 88] and subject to all security protection directives issued by the Chief Government Security Officer (CGSO).

Therefore, he said, any action to access, upload, download, alter, add or disseminate any data in Padu without authorisation is a criminal offence and if convicted, could result in imprisonment, fines or both.

He said that besides Act 88, data including computer equipment is also protected under the Computer Crimes Act 1997 [Act 563], which generally states that any unauthorised access, use of any device, information (data) or computer system is an offence.

This includes anyone accessing the system or using or obtaining or uploading or downloading data without authorisation from the Padu system, he said.

He said the Padu system development team always closely cooperates with various agencies managing national cyber security and data privacy such as CGSO, National Cyber Security Agency (Nacsa), CyberSecurity Malaysia (CSM), Department of Personal Data Protection (JPDP), and the Communications Ministry.

"To date, no data leakage issues have been reported although there have been two to 2.3 million attempted attacks on Padu in one week.

"The development of Padu also complies with international standards and best practice principles to ensure security is guaranteed,” he added, stating that the Padu system was developed internally using existing civil service expertise without involving external consultants to reduce the risk of information leakage.

Rafizi said that to ensure data integrity and prevent data leakage by officers with access to the data, an assessment of the integrity level of officers has been considered through a security screening process by CGSO.

He said data access is only granted to appointed officers and is limited to their respective roles only.

As of 11.59pm last night, the number of registrations increased to 7.7 million, compared to 5.4 million recorded on March 17.

"I assure you that with Padu, every citizen will receive fair and equitable benefits through better and more effective policy planning and implementation based on data,” he said.

Sarawak had requested several changes regarding the personal information required by the Padu system, stating that registering with the system requires disclosing too many personal details such as bank accounts properties and investments. — Bernama