14 Malaysian entities affected by IT outage

PUTRAJAYA: Five government agencies and nine private companies were affected by the global information technology (IT) outage on July 19, says Gobind Singh Deo.

The Digital Minister named the government agencies as Transport, Education and Rural and Regional Development Ministries, the National Institute of Health and the Kedah Zakat Board.

The nine private companies impacted are in the aviation, banking and healthcare sectors.

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“All data in the government sector are secured. There has been no data leakage. We have observed no issues regarding data integrity,” he told a press conference yesterday, Bernama reported.

However, Gobind said there had been a phishing attempt during the IT outage, which the government successfully prevented.

He said several phishing domains were created by irresponsible parties to obtain information and gain access to specific companies’ data.

Gobind said he met with representatives from Microsoft and CrowdStrike to deliver a firm message that their security levels must be strengthened.

“Microsoft is currently preparing a full report on the incident and has been asked to consider the claims submitted by Malaysian companies that suffered losses and damages as a result of the disruption,” he said.

On estimated losses incurred by the affected entities, Gobind said he has requested a full report but has not yet received it.

Gobind said the outage was not a cyber attack but was caused by a flaw in CrowdStrike’s update software, which disrupted Microsoft’s operating systems and prevented users from accessing their computers.