PH acquiring tools to combat financial cybercrimes - CICC

MANILA – The government is in the process of acquiring tools to combat crimes on financial technology, the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) said on Thursday.

“On the capacity of the Philippine government, we are acquiring tools that will be able to decouple, kasi (because) at the end of the day fintech [financial technology] crimes generally, so for you to go into fintech crimes, there are specific tools,” CICC deputy executive director Assistant Secretary Mary Rose Magsaysay said in a Bagong Pilipinas Ngayon interview aired over People's Television.

She disclosed that by next week the country would have the capacity to decouple or identify where the money went or came from even when data are already mixed up in an exchange.

Nonetheless, she said the CICC is capable to address breaches and hacking incidents.

“We get it in 30 minutes actually, we’re just unable to update. As I’ve said, we are 24/7, 365, when we get it in the middle of the night, we pass it on to our table analysts and everybody is usually on top of things,” Magsaysay said.

She noted that all government websites around the world are being hacked full-time and big time.

“Because it’s cheaper to do that, than to do an actual crime itself, to go to the agency para nakawan (for robbery) or something,” she added.

Last month, the Philippine National Police - Anti-Cybercrime Group (PNP-ACG) reported that about 624 online scam cases have been reported.

To safeguard everyone from such cases, the PNP-ACG has established more regional and provincial offices and cybercrime desks in police stations. (PNA)