Ever since Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced the relaxation of restrictions for those who are fully vaccinated, social media has been abuzz on the issue of vaccination certificates.
Digital certificates are easily accessible
The said certificates can be accessed through your MySejahtera application after you complete the full vaccination process. As the digital certificates can be easily screen-captured and printed out, they can be misused to create fake ones too.
For illustration purposes only.
According to KOSMO, people have started to print their digital Covid-19 certificates in the form of cards. A doctor was wondering,
“If someone can print their vaccination certificates that easily, then how would PDRM know which is real and which is fake?”
A simple search on several online shopping platforms shows that there are many vaccination certificate printing services but they have also clarified that it is only for keepsake purposes and not for official uses.
Be it as it may, the authorities will need to really check by scanning the QR code on the certificate and verify the identity of the individual. Kelantan Chief Police Datuk Shafien Mamat has said to Sinar Harian,
“Hopefully no one will show fake documents or vaccination certificates as the police have ways of knowing.”
Other than that, the Ministry of Health (KKM) has said that they will be taking strict action against anyone who tries to forge the digital Covid-19 certificate.
According to Awani, Deputy Minister of Health, Datuk Dr Noor Azmi Ghazali said that the ministry and authorities will be more alert with checking the authenticity of the vaccination certificates. He added that they will be discussing this issue and the ways that they can handle it in the next Ministry of Health (KKM) meeting. The deputy minister added that there is no need to print out the digital Covid-19 certificate as you would need to show it to the authorities via MySejahtera, reported Utusan.
The market is larger than we think
It is sad to say that the anti-vax community is larger than we think and with this new relaxation in restrictions, they will definitely do whatever it takes to be able to enjoy the same perks. This is not only happening in Malaysia, it’s also happening worldwide. According to Fortune, a person can easily get vaccination paperwork done (not only those of their own country but also those from different countries such as the UK, France or Germany) with a hefty price tag. You don’t even need to go to the dark web for this as some of them operate on messaging platforms.
So, think twice before you post your vaccination certificate out on social media as you might not know who will be downloading it and using it to forge certificates!
Also read: 84.6% Of Critical Covid-19 Patients Reported On 10 August Were Not Vaccinated, Says Health DG
