The Flemish liberal federal MP Goedele Liekens has become the latest in a series of members of the Chamber of Representative to discover that they have been spied on by hackers. Ms Liekens, who is known in the UK as the presenter of the Channel 4 sex education programme ‘Sex in Class’ announced that she had become a victim of hacking in a message posted on the social media Platform X. The former Miss Belgium says that the Chamber of Representatives urgently needs to take on more IT experts in order to ensure that its systems are better protected.
Goedele Liekens told VRT Radio 1’s morning news and current affairs programme ‘De ochtend’ that “Suddenly I wasn’t the manage of my own Dropbox anymore”. Above all there were issue with the MP’s assistant’s computer.
" Then we started looking back and it turned out that there was malware (a malicious programme, ed.) in an e-mail that appeared to come from the Vlaams Belang MP Steven Creyelman. He did not send them himself; I have asked him. That's how they got into my Dropbox and were able read everything that was in it for months."
Goedele Liekens used her Dropbox on all her devices. "The malware is really everywhere: on my laptop, my iPad, my phone, even on my desktop here at home. ICT specialists spent two days here cleaning everything up. Even the hard disk from my desktop had to be taken out.
The Flemish liberal MP is the latest of a series of politicians to fall victim to hacking. As was the case with the Flemish Chhristian democrate MP Els Van Hoof and Samuel Cogolati (Francophone green) and Georges Dallemagne (Francophone Christian democrat), Goedele Liekens believes that China is behind the hacking.
"I co-drafted a resolution with my colleague Marianne Verhaert that asked for an investigation into the treatment of Uighurs in China. I am 90% certain that it has something to do with that”.