NBI warns against possessing leaked Comelec data

MANILA - The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) on Friday night warned the public against possessing the personal data of voters from the Commission on Election's (Comelec) hacked website.

NBI Director Virgilio Mendez said he has ordered the agency's cybercrime division to go after those who have the Comelec data.

He said people who either upload or download the files from the internet may face criminal charges.

The Comelec website was defaced last month by members of Anonymous Philippines.

One of the alleged hackers was arrested Thursday.

Another group of hackers, however, also illegally accessed the Comelec site and leaked the sensitive personal data of around 55 million voters.

READ: Comelec data leak: How to protect yourself

Trend Micro, in its analysis of the defacement and subsequent leak of the Comelec's entire database online, said the data dump "may turn out as the biggest government related data breach in history."

"Based on our investigation, the data dumps include 1.3 million records of overseas Filipino voters, which included passport numbers and expiry dates. What is alarming is that this crucial data is just in plain text and accessible for everyone. Interestingly, we also found a whopping 15.8 million record of fingerprints and list of peoples running for office since the 2010 elections," the global security software company said.

Another group had access to the leaked data and created a website that allows the public to search the sensitive information.

Experts have warned that voters' data stolen from the Comelec website can be used by cyber criminals to steal and use other people's identities.

As reports of the data leak reverberated online Thursday, netizens called the government's attention after the Palace was allegedly among those accessing and spreading the sensitive information via torrent.

The Palace has yet to issue a statement on the torrent allegation. - with a report from Zyann Ambrosio, ABS-CBN News