DICT chief Ivan Uy steps down from post — reports
MANILA, Philippines — Ivan John Uy has tendered his resignation as secretary of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), according to media reports on Thursday, March 6.
Malacañang, however, could not confirm these reports as of posting. “Kung siya man po ay nag-resign, kung mayroon pong letter siyang pinadala na po, kailangan pa po itong ma-accept ng ating Pangulo. So, so far, wala pa po tayong update,” said Presidential Communications Undersecretary Claire Castro in a briefing on Thursday.
(If he did resign, if he did file a resignation latter, the President needs to accept this first. So far, we have no updates.)
Should President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. accept his resignation, he would be the third Cabinet member to step down in the first three months of 2025, following the resignation of former transportation chief Jaime Bautista and communications secretary Cesar Chavez.
His time with the DICT is muddled with multiple reports of hacking of the websites of government agencies — from the House of Representatives up to the data breach at the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth).
The DICT is the “primary policy, planning, coordinating, implementing, and administrative entity” of the executive in planning, developing, and promoting a national information and communication technology agenda.
It was Uy who oversaw the implementation of the SIM Card Registration Act, which aimed to curb rampant spam calls and texts. (READ: [ANALYSIS] Unintended consequences of the SIM Registration Act).
Despite the mandatory registration of SIM cards, the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordination Center logged around 6 million scam texts and 600,000 scam calls in 2024.
Groups requested the Supreme Court to temporarily halt SIM card registrations in 2023, citing violations to freedom of speech and its cognate rights. But the High Court junked this request.
In February, business groups also raised concerns regarding the proposed Konektadong Pinoy bill passed by the Senate on third and final reading in February to boost internet connectivity in the Philippines.
The Philippine Chamber of Telecommunications Operators (PCTO) pointed out that the removal of congressional franchise requirements for data transmission providers was unconstitutional and undermined fair competition principles.
“It may also compromise national security by granting access to critical infrastructure to potentially unregulated entities, both foreign and domestic,” the PCTO said.
Uy, an IT expert, was announced as Marcos’ DICT chief in May 2022, or two months before he took office. Uy was previously appointed to the Commission on Information and Communications Technology by the late president Benigno Aquino III before the commission’s dissolution in 2011.
He was also the chief information officer (CIO) at the Supreme Court under then-chief justice Hilario Davide Jr.
Talk of Uy’s firing — or resignation — has been rife in the past few weeks as Malacañang conducted an “evaluation” of the Cabinet. – with reports from Bea Cupin, Kaycee Valmonte, and Tatiana Maligro /Rappler.com