Taking yet another ‘hack’ at government’s incompetence
These hackers (for the purposes of Joe Public, who don’t know better, we’ll call them that, rather than the more PC ‘crackers’) can be nothing more than spotty teenagers with mischief in mind, or they could be part of an organised criminal syndicate, using people’s private data for their own nefarious ends.
The point of it all is that those of us who are less than au fait with the technological world (such as myself) have to trust that the various organisations out there that insist on us offering up our personal data like sacrificial lambs have good enough security procedures to prevent any old geek from hacking into it.
Which, of course, is the case with the vast majority of private businesses, who know which side of their bread is buttered and therefore look after their customers’ to the absolute best of their ability.
However, which organisation in South Africa appears to have a very un-customer service-like approach to its clients? Which enterprise seems to have been unable to make the concept of e-transactions work at all?
Or, to put it more succinctly, what is the one entity in this country that seems like it couldn’t manage to get someone drunk in a brewery?
The answer, of course, is our esteemed public sector, which – when not on strike, regardless of whether they are essential services or not – seems incapable of making the jump to cyberspace without endless troubles and subsequent denials of failure.
Take the recent hacking of the eNatis Web site as an example.
This is the same system that caused massive chaos in May when it crashed, leaving thousands confused and unsure as to the status of their forthcoming driver’s licence tests and vehicle licence applications.
The same system that a confidential report, which the Beeld had to go to court to be allowed to report on, had already warned was open to such an attack, as ‘one did not need a password to log on as an eNatis administrator and that documents on eNatis were not secured’.
And yet, when informed about the fact that that part of the eNatis Web site had been hacked, Transport Department spokesman Collen Msibi responded: "It's nothing to write home about".
He claims that only the public section of the site had been hacked and this wouldn't affect the functioning of the electronic national transport information and licensing system, since the hacker had no access to the records and personal information stored there.
"We are going to find out who did it and be more vigilant," Msibi said.
Thanks, that makes those of us with private data stored on eNatis feel so much better, I’m sure.
After all, when a report points out that the site is vulnerable, what does the department do? It goes to court to prevent a newspaper publishing these facts, rather than putting in the effort to fix the problem.
Then, when the exact type of event highlighted in the report actually occurs, the department claims it is ‘nothing to write home about’, promising to be ‘more vigilant’.
Surely we should expect more from them? Surely if they are prepared to allow the public to begin using the system, they should ensure that it is as secure as they possibly can make it?
But no, instead, the department claims that it is "disappointed" that people would attack a system meant to be useful to the public.
Because appealing to the philanthropy of the average citizen in a country with one of the highest crime rates in the world is really going to work, isn’t it?
Although I suppose at least when it comes to normal crime, we’ve got Jackie Selebi on the case…
…then again, perhaps the problems are even worse than we first realised!
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