Basic Education Minister, Siviwe Gwarube said that they suspected the breach may have emanated either from the department internally, through the sharing of information with stakeholders, or it may have been a cyber attack. Picture: Itumeleng English/ Independent Newspapers
Cape Town - Basic Education Minister, Siviwe Gwarube, said the State Security Agency and the country’s elite investigations unit, the Hawks, have been roped in to probe a possible breach in the 2024 National Senior Certificate (NSC) results.
Gwarube was answering questions from the media before her breakfast with the 2024 NSC Top Achievers in Randburg on Monday.
Her response came after it emerged on social media that a website was selling verified matric results to learners for as little as R100.
Gwarube said while there is a limit to what can be said due to the nature of the investigation, she could confirm the potential breach may have happened at the tail end of the results that had already been verified.
“We have become aware of a platform selling authentic matric results to learners and we have enlisted the services of the Hawks and the State Security to investigate the matter,” she said.
She added that they suspected the breach may have emanated either from the department internally, through the sharing of information with stakeholders, or it may have been a cyber attack.
Gwarube said they will also be looking at whether their systems are tight enough.
The breach, she said, will not affect the integrity of the results.
“We will make sure that we set an example to people who prey on learners. We’ve got the law on our side and we need to look at the system,” she said.
Meanwhile, Umalusi chief executive, Dr Mafu Rakometsi, said the Executive Committee approved the release of candidates’ results.
He said a total of 1 060 852 candidates participated in the 2024 end of year examinations.
Of that number, the NSC accounted for 832 993 candidates or 78.5% distributed across the DBE, IEB and SACAI.
“The remaining 227 859 or 21.5% candidates are distributed across three qualifications: 138 000 wrote the NC(V) L2-L4 examinations, 49 421 wrote the N2-N3 examinations, and 40 438 wrote the GETC: ABET examinations.
“The examinations were administered at a combined total of 9 566 examination centres distributed across the nine provinces of the country.
“As the law requires, all the examinations were subjected to the quality assurance processes of Umalusi,” Rakometsi said.
He said out of the 880 209 candidates who were registered to write the NSC examinations under the DBE, 810 900 managed to write.
“That implies that 69 309 or 7.9% of the registered students were absent from the examinations.
“The 810 900 candidates who sat for the examinations include 704 401 full-time candidates and 106 499 part-time candidates.”
The examination was written at 6 933 examination centres across the nine provinces and the DBE presented results of 68 subjects for standardisation, he said.