TM cyber attack: employees told to secure personal data

Transport Malta employees are being told to secure their personal data after a cyber-attack led to a breach in the authority's servers and intellectual property systems.

Between 25 September and 26 September Transport Malta suffered a cyber-attack that shut down its online systems. Five days later those systems were back up but the authority did not confirm whether any personal information had been compromised.

However, PN MP Jason Azzopardi posted photos of a circular addressed to Transport Malta employees informing them that its servers and intellectual property systems were subject to a cyber attack and advising them to take precautionary measures, including monitoring personal accounts and reviewing card transactions for unauthorised activity.

A data breach notification was submitted to the Office of the Information and Data Protection Commissioner, with Transport Malta coordinating with them to mitigate the effects of the breach.

“This notification is being issued now that Transport Malta has obtained a clearer picture of the extent and possible effects and consequences of the said cyber-attack so that you may apply and put in place all such measures which you may deem fit in order to protect any personal data or information which has been processed by Transport Malta,” the circular reads.

According to Jason Azzopardi, who posted photos of the circular to his Facebook page earlier today, the cyber attack caused a complete shut down of Transport Malta systems and resulted in the loss of all data under the Ports Directorate.

He also says that Transport Malta will likely have to collect data from scratch, with the hack likely having taken place in November 2019.

“When did you find out? What did you do when you found out? Is there no backup of lost data? Is it true that all data pertaining to the Ports Directorate is lost?” he asked.

“If it was for them, they would have kept this information hidden."