Comptroller issues scathing report: Cybersecurity failures in government ministries
Comptroller issues scathing report: Cybersecurity failures in government ministries
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/427636
Publish Date: 2026-05-26 10:22:00
Source Domain: www.israelnationalnews.com
Israel’s State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman on Tuesday published a series of sharply critical reports warning of serious failures in Israel’s cyber preparedness and in the quality of digital services provided to the public.
The reports detail what the Comptroller described as systemic failures, ongoing negligence, and organizational shortcomings in the Foreign Ministry, the Construction and Housing Ministry, the Courts Administration, and the National Digital Agency, during a period in which Israel remains a major target for cyber attacks by Iran and its proxies.
One of the most serious findings relates to the government’s conduct following the outbreak of the Swords of Iron war. According to the report, although the National Cyber Directorate formulated special emergency guidelines to protect against cyber attacks immediately after October 7, those instructions were not passed on to some of the country’s emergency bodies.
The report further found that a large majority of government ministries continued for months to use a key digital tool that was known to be vulnerable to cyber attacks and hostile infiltration.
The Comptroller’s review focused in particular on two central government ministries and pointed to what it described as years of neglect.
At the Foreign Ministry, the report cited a longstanding technological gap in the ministry’s computer systems, alongside organizational shortcomings that the Comptroller said did not match the level of intelligence-based threats facing the ministry. The report warned that in the absence of a comprehensive and updated cyber defense policy, the ministry remains vulnerable to cyber attacks and leaks of sensitive diplomatic information. Serious deficiencies were also found in the protection of personal information belonging to employees and citizens.
Regarding the Construction and Housing Ministry, the Comptroller found that despite holding extensive databases containing millions of sensitive records – including…
