The Department of Science and Technology (DOST) sought Thursday, July 1, “proper” investigation on the supposed cyberattacks against alternative media outfits to determine if the agency where the IP addressed was assigned to failed to adhere to standards and in effect, violated their contract.

DOST Undersecretary for Research and Development Rowena Cristina L. Guevara did not identify the agency to which the science department provided the IP addressed linked to the supposed cyberattacks in deference to the investigation being conducted by the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT).

"Our position in general, without naming names, is that any attack on any IP address that is malicious is not acceptable. However, we also believe that when we issue the IP addresses...we assumed that the agency to which we issue this address will do the protection necessary and will adhere to standards and acceptable usage policy within the network. Before we issue these IP addresses, we asked them to sign acceptable use policies and we expect them to adhere to these policies,” she said in an interview over ANC.

She explained that they cannot reveal the agency so as not to “put any added burden” to the DICT that is conducting the investigation.

“We would prefer that they do it properly and clinically, I would say, without the involvement of the public,” the DOST official said.

Guevara said one simple remedy that can be explored would be the removal of the IP address assignment, which she described as "the easiest thing to do.”

“But as I mentioned we need to do proper investigation to make sure indeed that there was a breach of the contract,” she pointed out.

Websites bulatlat.com, altermidya.org, as well as karapatan.org were hit by purported state-backed cyberattacks.

Guevara reminded that it is the responsibility of the government, media entities, and the private sector to protect their own servers against any attacks.

“The responsibility of protecting internet networks lies primarily on the owner of these servers. We expect that each one of us,the government, the media outlet, even the private sector will have to do its own effort in protecting its own server,” she said.

“For the DOST, what we do is more of the research and development, the artificial intelligence to figure out what is going on. These are the things we try to contribute towards protecting the networks not just the government, but the private sector,” she added.

The DOST scoffed last week at “unfounded” and “patently false” claims that it has been involved in cyberattacks on alternative media.

Related story: https://mb.com.ph/2021/06/24/dost-not-involved-in-cyberattacks-on-alternative-media/