TESDA pushes for additional security features in training certificates

The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) is seeking a P8.5 million budget for 2025 to introduce advanced security features in the national certificates that they are issuing amid the existence of fake ones.

Senator Joel Villanueva disclosed this during the continuation of the Senate plenary deliberations on the proposed 2025 national budget past midnight on Wednesday after Senator Sherwin Gatchalian asked the TESDA to confirm the existence of fake national certificates.

"The answer is in the affirmative...and to address this problem, TESDA aims to include advanced security features such as two-factor authentication, data encryption, and enhancements to the certificate management portal with TESDA's existing management system," Villanueva, who defends the budget of TESDA, responded.

"Ito po 'yung mga ilan sa mga nais tahakin ng TESDA para maprotektahan ang integridad at ang pagbibigay nitong TESDA certification," he added.

According to Villanueva, the P8.5 million for these advanced security features are already included in the National Expenditure Program or the budget proposed by the Executive Department to Congress and the funding was retained in the Senate version of the General Appropriations Bill or the bill containing the proposed national budget for 2025.

"In other words, we will now have budgets to prevent those fake...national certificates... We have now budgets to address and curb the fake national certificates," Gatchalian remarked.

As early as 2016, TESDA sought the National Bureau of Investigation's help to investigate the alleged syndicate involved in the production of fake National Certificate and Certificate of Competency (COC) which are only given by the government agency.

In 2023, TESDA warned the public against the national certificates offered online after a man was arrested in Cotabato City for selling fake TESDA certificates for P3,500.

Villanueva has filed a resolution in September seeking an investigation into the alleged proliferation of fake TESDA national certificates.

"It goes to show how important it is for an individual to get a certification by TESDA 'cause it has become a passport for employment. Some companies are also using it as a basis for salary increases, etcetera," Villanueva said during the budget deliberations. —LDF, GMA Integrated News