Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has ordered a review of the controversial bill on cybersecurity following a public outcry over what is seen as excessive power given to authorities to pry into personal information of private citizens and to penalize people accused of posing threats to cybersecurity.

Critics are particularly worried by the bill’s broad definition of the term  “cybersecurity threat” which also includes threat to national security.

Government spokesman Lt-Gen Sansern Kaewkamnerd said while the prime minister might not be fully aware of details of the bill, he does disagree with some of its provisions which he feels are ambiguous and would give too much power to the National Cybersecurity Committee to be set up under the bill and would affect the privacy rights of individuals.

Lt-Gen Sansern said the prime minister had assigned the legal affairs panel to review the bill in full details and to take into consideration check-and-balance mechanism to counter-weigh the power of authorities.

Meanwhile, the Association of Information Security will submit a letter to both the prime minister and Mr Pornpetch Wichitcholachai, president of the National Legislative Assembly, to scrap the existing Cybersecurity Bill and to write a new one.