In episode 24, cyber security expert Trevor Forest shared his take in the now infamous JamCovid scandal and how he thinks the international exposure has impacted Jamaica. The general consensus among the experts Trevor included is that not only did the discovered vulnerabilities expose the sloppiness of the developer but the slowness of the GOJ to respond in the face of a serious data exposure/breach.
There is however a big BUT, from early on several local experts and onlookers started questioning the true motivations and intentions behind the story. Specifically, why has Zack Whittaker, the tech Editor of the publication, shown such intense interest in the story? So much so in fact, that he has taken to his personal Twitter account to further expose even more flaws and in such great detail.
Summen Inna Summen?
Data Privacy, Tech & Intellectual Property Attorney Samantha Simms, was one such expert who in a series of Tweets shared her concerns around the reporting itself and asking why was the Jamaican system compromised.
Samantha is someone who’s opinion we should atleast consider given that she has been dealing with data breaches and compliance for over 20 years. She is also CEO of The Information Collective, a digital compliance consultancy supporting executives at data-driven companies in the Caribbean, EU, UK, and the US with pragmatic and pro-business digital compliance advice and the leading attorney at the recently launched Noir Digital Law firm in New York.
She knows all too well how these scenarios play out since she is often the attorney that gets called in to manage the fall out of an exposed data breach/vulnerability. And as you’ll hear from her this is not at all how she would’ve expected things to play out. It’s a very interesting conversation and one that made us question whether we were too quick to dismiss the suspicions.
It’s not as if Jamaica hasn’t been the target of vicious reporting in the past and nobody I’ve spoken thinks the government handled it well but given the barrage maybe in retrospect their response wasn’t so terrible??? Let’s hear what Samantha has to say about it. Listen tot he podcast below or watch full video of the conversation on our YouTube channel above.
Support the Podcast
There are 4 free and easy ways you can support the Digital Jamaica Podcast, subscribe, download episodes, share and leave a review.
