The Bureau of Immigration chief has admitted that the official files of the Bureau were hacked and erased last year.
Last year, Island Times received a tip from a confidential source that the database containing information about people entering and exiting Palau was hacked.
Flavin Misech who is currently the Chief of Immigration admitted that the server was hacked, however, he denied reports of entire database being wiped out.
“It was just a share folder. Share folder means I can create the share folder in the office and open the share folder at the airport while doing task at the airport. Everybody has a share folder so we can communicate via it.” Misech said.
According to Misech, the share folder contained individual cases and reports circling around the immigration department.
He later added that it also contained employee-based reports but didn’t specify the exact details of the report.
The shared folder hasn’t been recovered as of now and the data that was erased remains erased.
Island Times had also received information that when the files were hacked, Broken Tooth was in Palau.
Misech said that there is no connection between Broken Tooth and the hack that occurred.
Immigration has records on Broken tooth intact, Misech said, adding “He left April this year. He won’t be allowed in Palau under the new executive order.”
“There are people of interest but we are still working on getting their history or records, we are still working on it. We contacted some US offices.” Misech said about the new law on people with past criminal records entering Palau.
As per the last interview with Island Times, Misech is hoping for the technology immigration uses to be updated by 2020 Oceans Conference next year.
“We are working with US. One of my staff met with US official based in Manila, they are helping out with what the technology US is using for border management. We might arrive to use that technology soon, everything would be automated” He said.
“We already have the hardware but the IT needs to work if it is compatible with their [US] software,” he added. (By Eshan Kalyanikar)