NCIT developers to work from home: Minister Maleeh

Minister of Communications, Science and Technology Maleeh Jameel, on Wednesday, announced the decision to transition the Ministry's developers to work from home.

An agreement to facilitate the transition was signed between Minister Maleeh, and the Lead Developer of the National Centre for Information Technology (NCIT), Ahmed Yasir.

At present, a total of 12 developers work for the institution.

"This has been a long-standing request of NCIT employees. When such challenges arise, I think we are finding solutions", said the Minister.

Moreover, Maleeh stated that the move would ease the lives of NCIT employees based in reclaimed suburb Hulhamle', Vilimale' as well as those in Male'.

In the future, the minister plans to roll out the initiative for as many employees as possible.

Minister Maleeh also noted his intention to further strengthen "work from home" opportunities at a policy-level in the future, thus providing technical employees, especially those working in the area of software development, with the ability to work from any island across the archipelago.

In order to facilitate the change, the Ministry has formulated guidelines under which employees can work from their homes.

Minister of State for Communications Ali Solih revealed that employee systems were confirmed to be secure before the changes were implemented.

Recently, in February, the Ministry Communications, Science and Technology came under heavy fire over hackers leaking hundreds of emails, usernames and passwords belonging to Maldivian state institutions in addition to some from other countries. However, the ministry stated that the National Data Centre does not face the danger of a data breach, adding that a memo would be distributed to all offices to increase security on the protective measures for emails and passwords in government offices.

NCIT manages a total of 30 government systems. However, due to shortages in developers, the institution is now hiring additional staff.

The World Health Organization has classified the spread of COVID-19 as a global pandemic. The novel coronavirus has infected over 1,518,000 people and claimed over 88,400 lives around the world. However, out of those infected, more than 330,700 people have recovered.