A month after millions of private and confidential data were hacked and stolen, and all the Deputy Minister of MCMC can tell us is to change our passwords regularly?

Yesterday, Deputy Minister of Communications and Multimedia Datuk Seri Jailani Johari told Malaysians to change passwords regularly and to not reveal personal information over the internet in order to protect themselves against cyberattacks.

Sebagai pengguna, seharusnya memastikan, seboleh-bolehnya, jangan kongsikan apa sahaja maklumat mengenai kita di dalam media sosial yang kita punya. 

Sebaik-baiknya, sekurang-kurangnya tiga bulan sekali, kita tukar kata laluan. Dan kalau boleh kita gunakan alphanumeric numbers.  Dan kita juga jangan sewenang-wenangnya memaut mana-mana pautan yang kita rasakan tidak sesuai kerana ia akan memberikan kesan kepada kita.

The Deputy Minister said this in Parliament in response to a question on the steps taken by the Government in the cases which involved leakage of confidential personal data.

Datuk Seri Jailani’s comment is dangerously simplistic and avoids the government’s role in ensuring our cyber security.

For example, the recent sale of millions of breached personal data shows just how vulnerable Malaysians are to having our information stolen – and it has absolutely nothing to do with the need for users to change passwords regularly.

The Ministry’s response to this critical issue has also revealed not only how misplaced their priorities are, it also revealed that the Government is utterly clueless as to what to do to address the problems.

Rather than assuring people of an investigation, the MCMC’s first move was to take down the initial news report of the sale. Last week, it blocked the website sayakenahack.com which allowed users to key in their IC numbers to check if their details had been found in the data breached from Malaysian telco companies.

The question that keeps re-emerging is who the Government is really protecting with these measures. It appears that they are more inclined to protect the reputation of the huge corporations which were entrusted with our confidential data by covering up the scandal, instead of taking the bull by the horns to protect everyday Malaysians.

Taking those precautionary measures, as advised by the Deputy Minister, would have nothing to protect Malaysians from having their personal data being sold.

What’s worrying is that Malaysia was revealed last year, in a survey done by global cyber-security firm Kaspersky Labs, as having the most compromised servers in Southeast Asia.

Rather than constantly telling consumers to be more careful, the government needs to be urging data holders including themselves to improve their own standards instead of passively monitoring and not acting on these severe breaches.

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GST Prepaid - What You Pay Is NOT What You Get

Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek’s announcement that the mobile prepaid reload “reverts” to RM10 for RM10 credit with GST deducted only upon mobile usage proved that the BN Government and him are deceitful cheats

We read with complete disbelief that the Communications and Multimedia Minister, Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek proudly announced that consumers who purchase an RM10 mobile prepaid reload will receive an RM10 credit upon activation. However, in the same breath, he said users will subsequently be taxed 6% GST on their usage.



The announcement is highly deceitful because users no longer receive RM10 of airtime for each RM10 purchase. Instead, they are effectively receiving only RM9.43 of call services for every RM10 paid. There is hence no difference at all from the controversial hike in mobile prepaid prices by the telecommunication companies on 1st April where consumers had to pay RM10.60 for RM10 of airtime.

This disappointing announcement comes after Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery promised Malaysians on live television a week ago that “the rakyat want to purchase RM10 worth of prepaid credit, and they want to get airtime worth RM10. That’s what the people want… That’s why I have made the decision that if this is what the rakyat want, then that is my decision.”

It also means that the Minister has betrayed the rakyat’s interest in favour of even more profit for the already highly profitable telecommunication companies. Prior to 1st April 2015, users received RM10 of airtime for every RM10 spent, as every telcos absorbed the then 6% service tax. By using the switch from a 6% service tax to the 6% GST as a ruse, the Minister is supporting the collusion by the telecommunication companies for a uniform 6% price hike.

Last year, despite absorbing the 6% service tax, Maxis Communications, Digi Telecommunications and Celcom Axiata made pre-tax profits of RM2.44 billion, RM2.65 billion and RM3.1 billion respectively in 2014. In total, they collected RM12.8 billion in prepaid mobile services revenue for the year. Why is the BN Government helping these highly profitable companies make an additional estimated RM770 million in profits?

The above decision makes a complete mockery of the Anti-Profiteering Act which sought to prevent businesses from raising prices unreasonably in conjunction with the implementation of the GST.

The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak blamed the GST burden currently experienced by the people on “profiteering activities” and demanded that the relevant authorities “come down hard on the profiteers and unscrupulous traders who manipulated the GST for their own extra financial gains”. Yet, when dealing with multi-billion ringgit telcos, the Najib administration turns a blind eye on these unscrupulous profiteers.

The prepaid mobile services price hike doesn’t only run afoul of the Anti-Profiteering Act, it also breaches the competition clauses of the Communication and Multimedia Act 1998. This is because all the telecommunication companies are raising prices by a uniform 6% at the very same time. It clearly reflects an anti-competitive and collusive practice.

Under Part IV (Economic Regulations), Chapter 2 (General Competition Practices) Clause 133, telecommunications operators are prohibited from “entering into collusive agreements”. It says that a licensee shall not enter into any understanding, agreement or arrangement, whether legally enforceable or not, which provides for rate fixing and market sharing, among other terms.

Therefore, we call upon the Minister stop being a cheat with his play of numbers and words. He must stop being deceitful to the Malaysian public by constantly twisting and turning his positions in order to support the multi-billion ringgit profits of the large telecommunication companies. The Najib administration must stop the duplicity of taking action against petty traders for alleged profiteering, while letting these big sharks get away scot free.



Tony Pua

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Stop the Impossible Task of regulating the Impossible

From a university dropout, William Henry Gates III turning lines of codes into the Windows Operating System first released back in 1985, to a Harvard social misfit, Mark Zuckerberg creating the world most successful social media site – Facebook.com, the industry is one that is fertilised by impulse and innovation, perpetually morphing and forever intruding into every aspect of our lives.

The industry is so pervasive that hardly any product escapes its reach. Computer programming is required today to build your car, produce movies and animations, set up manufacturing plants and to develop an efficient order management system to deliver pizzas. IT is the industry of making what was "impossible", possible.

The draft Computer Professionals Bill 2011 however, is an ill-conceived impossible attempt by the Government to regulate the “impossible”. The proposed bill fails because the limits and scope of the law cannot be strictly defined as the industry changes by the minute.

“Computing services” for example, will include today, website designers, setting up blogs or anyone producing an animated Flash-game for your Facebook. In fact, with seamless integration of a simple word processor, such as Microsoft Word with the Internet, a desk clerk now effectively becomes a provider of “computing services”.

The definition of “critical national information infrastructure” will be equally impossible define as it would and could encompass any industry from the government sector to financial services to the telecommunication communications or even the airline or transportation industry. Surely a failure in any of these industries would have a “devastating impact on national economic strength”.

Putting the two indefinable terms together will result in absurd outcomes. An advertising agency offering web design services for a bank will have to become a “Registered Computing Services Provider”, or a technician providing maintenance services of computer hardware in a government office would have to be registered as a “Registered Computing Professional” or a “Registered Computing Practitioner”, whichever applicable.

What is unimaginable would be for Microsoft to have all its computer programmers in the United States registered with the Board of Computing Professionals in Malaysia, before the company could sell its software to entities providing “critical national information infrastructure” in the country! If Microsoft or Hewlett Packard or any other product developer or manufacturer involving “computer services” from overseas could be exempted from being “registered”, then why should Malaysians be penalised for being unregistered?

The Bill and the bureaucracy to be created with its implementation will become an utter waste or resources for both the Government and the industry. Registration of practitioners or professionals does not guarantee quality and will not lift industry standards. If other countries from the United States to South Korea, from to Singapore to Germany and from India to South Africa do not require such a Bill to design, develop and produce top quality computing and related products, what makes the Government think that such a Bill will miraculously make Malaysia a top computing nation?

In fact, the implementation of such a Bill will only lead to an exodus of talent in Malaysia because they will find the environment substantially more conducive in other countries to pursue their computing dreams.

Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and hundreds of others did not succeed because they registered with a “Board of Computing Professionals” in the United States or elsewhere in the world. On the contrary, their success is based precisely on an environment which encouraged unrestrained creativity, breeding innovation without the leash.

The Malaysian Government will do well to admit the mistake that is the Computing Professionals Bill, and withdraw the thought of ever tabling the bill in the Parliament.

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The Computing Professionals Bill 2011: An Orwellian "Big Brother"

The draft Computing Professionals Bill 2011 (CPB2011) which is currently being circulated for "consultation" is an attempt by MOSTI to regulate all "computing services" provided to entities or persons related to the "critical national information infrastructure" (CNII).

"Computing services" is defined as any services provided to "plan, architect, design, create, develop, implement, use and manage information technology systems". Based on this definition, the scope of such services would cover anything from designing websites to the setting up of computer servers to the design and development of any computer products - whether software or hardware. In fact, one would easily classify the setting up of blogs and news portals, or even use of Facebook and Twitter accounts as being covered under "computing services".

"CNII" on the other hand, is defined as "those assets, systems and functions that are vital to the nation that their incapacity or destruction would have a devastating impact on National economic strength or National image or National defense and security or Government capability to function or Public health and safety".

CNII could hence cover any entity in the Government, financial institutions and government linked companies. What is absolutely frightening is the definition would also cover all the way to any website, portal or information technology application which could have a detrimental impact on the "National image" or deemed to hurt the "Government's capability to function".

Any ambiguity in the law shall be determined by the 15 imember "Board of Computing Professionals" appointed at the sole discretion of the Minister, and subjected only to the Minister's approval.

Contrary to the clarification statement made by MOSTI, which claimed that the bill does not restrict the practise of "computing services" and is only limited to CNII, the bill has pervasive and damaging consequences not only on the information technology industry, but also infringes on key Goverment commitments under the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) Bill of Guarantees.

The Bill of Guarantees have promised "unrestricted employment of knowledge workers" and "no censorship of the Internet". However the CPB 2011 will clearly restrict the hiring of knowledge workers by necessitating registration. Similarly, the CPB 2011 as it is currently defined could be used to register, regulate and restrict the activities of individuals or corporations to publish news reports or those who use Facebook, Twitter or other similar applications with the excuse of protecting the "National image".

It is clear that the flimsily drafted CPB has the Orwellian "big brother" fingerprints all over it.

The information technology and computing industry has been operating without controversy, issues or impediment for the past decades. There is absolutely no bureaucratic requirement to restrict and control the industry, which will only bring adverse outcomes without any corresponding tangible benefit.

I will personally attend the CPB 2011 Open Day organised by MOSTI tomorrow to hear the Ministry's clarifications on the bill, and to submit the relevant points of objection.

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