Philippine tax agency investigates alleged data leak

Manila: The Philippines’ Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) is investigating reports of a possible data leak involving information allegedly linked to the agency.

The BIR said it was treating the allegations as a priority and had stepped up security measures while working with government cybersecurity and law enforcement agencies.

The investigation involves the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), the National Computer Emergency Response Team, the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center and the Philippine National Police Anti-Cybercrime Group.

The agency has not disclosed what information may have been involved or how many people, if any, could be affected.

No confirmed breach

The investigation follows wider reports of alleged data leaks involving Philippine government agencies.

In a statement on November 6, the National Privacy Commission (NPC) said it had not received personal-data breach notifications from the agencies concerned as of that date.

The privacy regulator said it would coordinate with the agencies to establish whether personal information had been compromised.

It stressed that allegations of a data leak do not, on their own, establish that a personal-data breach has occurred.

Previous website incident

In September, the BIR reported a brief website defacement. The agency said at the time that its initial assessment found no impact on taxpayer information or core systems.

The BIR has not established a connection between that incident and the latest allegations.