The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has constituted an 11 member bid evaluation committee to oversee the procurement of IT security tools and services to upgrade its databases to prevent hacker attacks.
Sources told that FBR wants to procure different hardware and software such as Oracle ACS services for implementation of database security, VMware virtualization, backup and recovery, secure E-mail, a web gateway, WAF, ADC, security incident, event management system, and establishment of security operation center, perimeter firewall, and Microsoft windows server, in the first phase.
In addition, the department, in the second phase, will procure privileged access management and SQL database access management, network monitoring solution and log analyses server, backup expansion, Commvault licenses, IRIS middleware solution, WebLogic/JBoss, middleware OS, RHEL8.X or oracle, Linux, Exadata expansion/CC, and SD-WAN solution for FBR.
The TOR of the bid evaluation committee includes technical and financial evaluation of submitted documents, ensuring bidding documents are free from technical omissions and deviations, critical review of the specification, quantities, or cost estimates of submitted bids, preparing evaluation report as per rule 35 of PPRA rules 2004 From the day of the opening of bids, the committee shall complete evaluation and submit recommendation within one week.
Earlier, FBR had also notified the procurement evaluation committee in November 2021, and recently chairman FBR ordered an inquiry to conduct a fact-finding inquiry to investigate failed attempts of emergency procurement worth $26 million under the Pakistan Raises Revenue program through the world bank.
The Economic Coordination Committee of Cabinet had also approved Rs. 3.8 billion Technical Supplementary Grant for procurement of hardware of software for up-gradation of FBR data system.
It is worth mentioning here that Pakistan and WB had signed a $400 million Pakistan Raises Revenue program to increase Pakistan’s tax-to-GDP ratio to 17 percent, increasing the number of active taxpayers to 3.5 million, reducing the compliance burden of paying taxes, and improving the efficiency of customs controls.
