Justice department system outage causes delay on payments of child maintenance
The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development says the payments of child maintenance has been delayed due to the breach of its IT systems.
The systems were targeted during a ransomware attack about a week ago.
This has initially affected the issuing of letters of authority, bail services, email and the departmental website.
Now, the department’s Steve Mahlangu has confirmed that the system used to administrate child maintenance payments has become the latest victim.
“While the Department is not able to determine the exact date when the required systems will be restored, the Department will ensure that all child maintenance money is kept secure for payment to the rightful beneficiaries when the systems are back online. The current system challenges do not affect the receipt of child maintenance money from the maintenance paying parent or employers who deduct these from the paying parent’s salary. The monthly child maintenance deductions will go ahead as scheduled,” says Mahlangu.
He says IT experts from the department and industry partners are working together to urgently restore the systems affected.
“The MojaPay system will be given the utmost priority to ensure that any inconvenience to maintenance beneficiaries is minimised.
The IT experts have thus far managed to come up with an alternative email system for better coordination of the Department’s crisis response plan. Staff members at various levels have been migrated into the new email solution,”
In the meantime, the department’s website has been restored.
Mahlangu says the masters are continuing the work using the manual process.
“The Master's Offices are currently, as an interim measure, using a manual process to provide bereaved families, in exceptional cases, where there is a need to access funds from the deceased's banking account for burial costs. No manual letters of executorship or authority will be issued in this crisis period,” he said.
In July, Transnet was hit by a cyber attack in what the company said was a “security intrusion and sabotage”.
This led to the temporary closure of harbours and delays in the transporting of goods across the country.
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