The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) said Tuesday, Jan. 7, that it has effective detection and prevention systems in place to thwart any cyberattack targeting the country amid the reported infiltration of Chinese hackers into the office of President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.
Marcos has ordered the military to fortify not only its cyber defenses but other government agencies as well, according to AFP spokesperson Col. Francel Margareth Padilla.
“Cyberattacks are a daily occurrence,” she said. “We have intrusion detection systems in place and intrusion prevention systems that are in place.”
A report from United States-based Bloomberg News said that Chinese-state sponsored hackers allegedly infiltrated the Office of the President’s (OP) computer systems where sensitive data were stolen, including documents related to the West Philippine Sea (WPS) territorial row between Manila and Beijing.
The AFP neither confirmed nor denied the reported cyberattack.
However, Padilla said the AFP has been “tweaking” the organization to respond to new emerging threats.
“In the past months, we have activated our Cyber Command. So it is working in tandem now with our Intelligence Command. We are looking at all of this, and it's a given that the threats in the cyber domain will be there,” the military spokesperson stated.
“But what is important is that we are able to detect and we are able to deter these attacks,” she noted.
According to the Bloomberg report citing three sources privy to the reported hacking, the infiltration allegedly occurred from early 2023 to June 2024. It said cybersecurity experts flagged the attacks in 2023 and in August last year.
The report said it was part of a bigger plan to compromise various institutions or groups in the Philippines.
The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DITC) said some allied countries of the Philippines such as Australia, Japan, United States and United Kingdom have reached out to the government to provide technical support to investigate the incident.
China’s Foreign Ministry denied the allegation, stressing that its government “consistently opposed all forms of hacking and cyberattacks.”