Employee arrested for cyber attack on labour department

25 January 2020 - 13:49
By TimesLIVE
A labour department employee has been arrested in connection with a cyber attack on one of the department's servers this week.
Image: 123RF/dolgachov A labour department employee has been arrested in connection with a cyber attack on one of the department's servers this week.

An employee has been arrested in connection with a cyber attack this week in which one of the department of employment and labour’s servers was hacked.

Spokesperson for the department Teboho Thejane said on Saturday that the employee, who was arrested on Friday, was stationed at the Sandton labour centre.

A criminal case had been opened and further investigations were under way, he said.  

Thejane said the Compensation Fund’s Anti-Corruption & Integrity management team had been alerted about the cyber attack on Tuesday.

“The hacker hacked more than 300 employees, which resulted in their logon details being compromised for malicious purpose. The Compensation Fund cyber crime team attended to the incident and have been able to identify one of the employees. The arrested employee was stationed at the Sandton Labour Centre. The suspect was arrested on Friday.”

The police were accompanied by the fund’s Anti-Corruption team during the arrest.

“The fund is committed to curb fraud and corruption and ensure that every person caught committing this act to prejudice the fund or department is brought to book. The department of employment & labour is committed to zero tolerance against fraud and corruption,” Thejane said.