PCSO chief denies data breach claim: It’s fake news
PCSO General Manager Melquiades Robles 黑料社 file photo / Faith Argosino
MANILA, Philippines – The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) on Friday dismissed claims that the agency’s database was breached by an alleged group of hackers, adding that information of lotto winners was not compromised.
According to PCSO General Manager Mel Robles, the claim was made to taint the integrity of the agency’s games.
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“This is fake news. There was no breach nor any successful attempt to hack the systems of PCSO. We have not reported anything to DICT [Department of Information and Communications Technology] because nothing had happened,” Robles said in a Facebook statement.
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Article continues after this advertisement“While there were numerous attempts (in the past) to hack our system coming from all over the world, our digital defenses are holding out and remain impregnable,” Robles added.
Article continues after this advertisementThis came after a Facebook post made by Philippines Exodus Security, a group who claim to be a “red teamer” or an entity responsible for compromising digital networks, said that they got a hold of the PCSO’s data, including emails, and lotto winners’ profiles.
“Now sitting on thousands of lotto winners’ profiles from 2016 to 2025. Details they thought were safe: names, addresses, phone numbers, IDs, and even winning numbers. All of it. Private info they never wanted public,” the post read.
“I own their network. I see everything. Every email, every transaction, every piece of data they think is secure. They’re blind, clueless, and vulnerable,” it added.
However, Robles clarified that no PCSO accounts were hacked, pointing out that the group said that they infiltrated email accounts of PCSO employees, who were “most probably” from the Cagayan branch based on the post’s screenshot.
Further, he noted that data of lotto winners were not compromised based on the group’s post containing a list of participants of a March 2022 promo of PCSO Cagayan branch.
READ: DICT: Chinese mostly behind 2,900 hackings foiled per year
The PCSO stated that “[t]he picture of a woman holding tickets is a proof that the promo tickets were availed of by “real” people, thus the information published by the hackers actually belong to the recipients of a promo of a branch in Cagayan in March of 2022 and not of lotto winners.”
“Our database for the lotto jackpot winners is safe in the head office. The branch officers are not connected to the head office,” Robles added.
