KUALA LUMPUR, July 16 —The Science, Technology and Innovation Ministry has set up a two-factor authentication system in the MySejahtera smartphone app that will prevent anyone from bypassing it to sell the much sought-after Covid-19 vaccination appointments from now on.

Its minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the MySejahtera app’s “Add Vaccine Dependent” feature had a loophole that enabled agents at vaccination centres (PPVs) to make changes and potentially abuse it for profit.

“We are going to introduce a two-factor authentication for people who want to add vaccinees manually, so there will be a timestamp and a personal identification associated with anybody who adds the vaccinee manually.

“So if there are instances of syndicates or cartels at PPVs, we will be able to identify them,” he told reporters in today’s Covid-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF) press conference with Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Adham Baba.

The controversy emerged after many people took to social media to complain about others who seemed to be able to gain vaccine appointments ahead of their turn.

National news agency Bernama reported that a multi-agency investigation into the sale of vaccination appointment slots following a police report filed by a PPV worker in Kuala Lumpur about the higher number of recipients when compared to vaccine doses allocated at the facility.