Philippines Elections: Globe, PLDT backing out as data centers

Fearing physical or technical attacks, Philippines’ Globe Telecoms Tuesday proposed to withdraw its offer to host the main data center that would transmit the election results of the May 10 polls on its premises in Makati City, the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported.

Expressing similar apprehension, Philippine Long Distance Company (PLDT) also attempted to get out of its previous offer to set up a “backup” data center in its Makati offices.

Instead, both Globe and PLDT proposed alternative sites to host the servers of the Commission on Elections (Comelec). The new sites would be inspected on Wednesday and it would be announced later if the locations would meet standards for the secure transmission of poll results.

Comelec Chair Jose Melo said the new sites offered by the two firms in Clark, Pampanga, “did not measure up to the standards.”

Smartmatic-TIM later found that PLDT Clark and Globe ComClark “did not comply with the technical/infrastructure specifications.”

PLDT was offering just “a small office” while Globe ComClark lacked “the required redundancy mechanism, that included communications equipment, internal network cabling, among others,” the joint venture said.

Comelec Executive Director Jose Tolentino also sought to allay fears of Globe and PLDT, saying that should there be any technical attacks on them, government agencies they were servicing would not be affected.

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