SABC, The South African Broadcasting Corporation’s PayNow service for TV licence is unavailable, meaning holders will have to go to a physical pay point to process their payment.
This comes after My Broadband reported a major reported a major security flaw relating to SABC’s TV license web portal that allowed attackers to view people’s account information and outstanding bills without needing their password.
“We are currently experiencing issues on PayNow. We apologise for the inconvenience,” the SABC’s TV licence page reads.
“Our range of physical pay points extends to Banks, the Post Office, Retailers, Easypay outlets, Pay At outlets, SABC Head Office and branches.”
It is unclear when SABC took its TV licence system offline.
Notably, the SABC has not provided any reason why the system is unavailable. MyBroadband reached out to the SABC for comment, but it did not immediately provide feedback.
Earlier in July, MyBroadband received a tip about the flaw from a reader who had discovered the vulnerability.
We immediately informed the SABC about the issue and enquired about a coordinated disclosure arrangement.
“The SABC is investigating this matter, as the security of its platforms and protection of its clients’ personal information is of utmost importance,” the state-owned broadcaster said in response to questions.
The vulnerability allowed attackers to access licence holders’ accounts without their login credentials.
They could view outstanding bills, download an account statement, and view and change address information on file.
Screenshots of the most pertinent details attackers could see and alter are shown below.
This security flaw was not the SABC’s first run-in with vulnerabilities on its TV licence portal.
In 2016, a reader pointed out that the SABC’s payment gateway provider was using an outdated encryption algorithm to protect sensitive payment information.
In another incident toward the end of 2020, the SABC warned license holders about a hack of its portal, advising them not to leave their details on the website. The next day it announced it had resolved the hack.
These security issues could exacerbate the broadcaster’s problem with TV licence payment evasion, which as of March 2021, had reched 82%.
Therefore, only 18% of registered TV licence holders were paying the fees. This excludes households that should have registered for a TV Licence, but haven’t.
The evasion figure was up from 76% in 2020, after increasing from 69% in March 2019.
The SABC has proposed a public media levy to replace TV licences to help address its revenue collection issues.
This proposed levy would essentially be a tax on all households and businesses in South Africa that must be paid regardless of whether they watch the SABC’s content or own a TV.
Instead, it would be based on being able to access its content on any platform — including online services like YouTube.
The SABC has also proposed that South Africa’s largest pay-TV broadcaster, currently MultiChoice, must help collect the levy on its behalf.
While MultiChoice supports the public media levy, it has opposed the proposal that it should collect fees on the SABC’s behalf. It has suggested that the levy should be collected like any other tax.
Source: My Broadband
