On Friday the police ordered the launch of an investigation after unknown authors sent e-mail messages in the name of the Chief Medical Officer and the National Centre for Public Health primarily to health care and state institutions and businesses, the Spokesperson of the National Police Constabulary announced at the Friday online press conference of the Operational Group responsible for the containment of the coronavirus epidemic.

Lt. Colonel Kristóf Gál added that in the e-mail messages the unknown authors promised to supply protective equipment free of charge, and sought to induce the addressees to complete an enclosed form.

The poor wording of the message and the fact that it met neither formal, nor content requirements invited suspicion in themselves, the Lt. Colonel said.

He added that they are asking the addressees of the messages not to open the attachment. He also asked addressees to send the messages to the National Cyber Defence Institute at the address [[[OBdwYKmhMJbaAXR8YNicTkcZY3NpcnRAbmtpLmdvdi5odQ==]]], thereby assisting the authorities’ work.

Police Lt. Colonel Róbert Kiss, a staff member of the duty centre of the operational group highlighted that the amendment of the government decree on border crossing which now allows Austrian, Czech, German, Slovak and Croatian nationals to enter the territory of Hungary without restrictions has been published in Magyar Közlöny [Hungarian Gazette] and entered into force at eight a.m. on Friday.

Based on the amendment of the government decree, Hungarian nationals who enter the territory of Hungary from Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and from Friday from Croatia may likewise do so without disease control restrictions.

The Lt. Colonel observed that nationals of the European Economic Area who are entitled to permanent residence in Hungary and are able to verify this come under the same consideration as Hungarian nationals.

Mr Kiss further reported that by Friday the number of persons registering for the mobile phone application serving the electronic monitoring of compulsory home quarantine had risen to 2,586, including 778 active users. In the past 24 hours, the authorities have issued 315 compulsory home quarantine orders; with this, the number of such restrictive orders in effect in total has risen to 8,834.

The police Lt. Colonel also highlighted that 437 criminal procedures had been instituted in connection with disease control measures, including 125 due to scaremongering, 29 due to the threat of public endangerment, 132 due to fraud and 28 due to the violation of disease control regulations. In these cases, the police have questioned 81 persons so far.

(Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister/MTI)