The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday that it has stepped up information security measures after allegedly being attacked by hackers.
Mainland Affairs Council Deputy Minister Wu Mei-hung (吳美紅) said the MAC Web site and e-mails have been targeted by hackers amid attacks on several government agencies in Taiwan.
“To prevent similar incidents in the future, the MAC will keep its system software updated at all times,” Wu said, adding that the China policymaking body has increased staff e-mail protection amid other measures.
Wu did not specifically say the attacks originated in China, but she did say that after the Web site of Taiwan’s Apple Daily was attacked in mid-June, the MAC conveyed its concerns to its Chinese counterpart at a cross-strait meeting late that month.
Taiwanese government agencies are keeping a close watch on China’s so-called “cyberarmy” and are taking measures to protect themselves from hackers, she said.
Wu’s remarks came a day after Minister of Science and Technology Simon Chang (張善政) said in a radio interview that Chinese hackers attack Taiwan almost daily, mainly attempts to steal information and discover Taiwan’s “bottom line” in negotiations.
Chang said that while cross-strait ties continue to warm, there are major attacks on local computer systems every few months.
Media reports have said that with increased negotiations between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, China’s alleged army of hackers has focused on government agencies involved in talks, such as the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Health and Welfare, with the aim of seizing information on Taiwan’s terms in negotiation.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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