Taiwan is to test its cyberdefense capabilities in the first-ever Cyber Offensive and Defensive Exercises to be held with the US in November, Vice Premier Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) said yesterday.
Chen, who is also head of the Cabinet department for information security, said that in the wake of increasing cyberattacks targeting the government, the department has been holding regular cybersecurity drills to test the readiness and responsive capabilities of related authorities.
As part of ongoing efforts to respond to such threats, Chen said Taiwan and the US are to hold the five-day Cyber Offensive and Defensive Exercises in early November.
Photo: Ko Yu-hao, Taipei Times
The drill was first announced by American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Director Brent Christensen during a cybersecurity forum in Taipei on Tuesday.
According to Chen, the exercises will be similar to the Cyber Storm exercises, which are the US Department of Homeland Security’s exercises to strengthen cyberpreparedness in the public and private sectors, held every two years.
First launched in 2006, the exercises were last held in the spring of last year.
Chen said the upcoming exercises in Taiwan would be divided into two parts, with the first testing the response of government staff and officials to phishing e-mails or text messages, which are the most common form of cyberattack.
The second part of the drill would examine responses in the public and private sectors to cyberattacks launched from foreign countries or locally, he said.
The Cyber Offensive and Defensive Exercises are scheduled to bring together teams from 15 nations to address simulated cyberthreats from North Korea, targeting social engineering, critical infrastructure and financial institutions, Chen said.
He would not name the 15 countries, saying only that the teams would be Asian, European and American.
The teams are to be designated blue (defense) and red (attack), with Taiwan’s security team as the blue team and the 15 other countries as the red team.
The simulated attacks will attempt to hack official Taiwanese government Web sites to test the capability of local cybersecurity teams to protect them and respond to the potential effects of such attacks, Chen said.
Taiwan is hoping that the debut cybersecurity drill will not only prepare the government for attacks, but also help Taiwan and other nations form a joint cybersecurity network, he added.
CAUTION: Taiwanese should be alert, even if they have just liked or shared posts that would breach Beijing’s national security legislation for Hong Kong, the council said Due to the newly implemented Hong Kong national security legislation, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has drawn up a list of what it described as “high-risk groups,” cautioning them not to travel to Hong Kong. People who support independence for Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang; those who are critical of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the Hong Kong government and the “one country, two systems” concept; and those who donated to or voiced support for the Hong Kong anti-extradition bill movement are urged to refrain from visiting Hong Kong, the council said on its Web site. It released two posts on
HONG KONG SECURITY: The president blasted regulations requiring Taiwanese agents or political organizations to provide information on their Hong Kong-related activities President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday warned of countermeasures should controversial Chinese national security legislation imposed on Hong Kong undermine or harm Taiwanese interests. Article 43 of the legislation empowers the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to serve written notices to Taiwanese political organizations or individual agents to furnish information on their Hong Kong-related activities, including their personal particulars, finances, assets, expenditure and capital in the territory. Failure to comply or providing false or incomplete information can result in a fine of HK$100,000 (US$12,903) or imprisonment of six months or two years respectively. Tsai said that Taiwan would keep a close watch on how
MORAL COURAGE: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged the global community to face China’s intention to subdue Taiwan and reject such irrational requests The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday strongly condemned the Chinese government for meddling with US officials’ interactions with Taiwan after FBI Director Christopher Wray revealed China’s efforts to discourage US officials from visiting Taiwan. The greatest long-term threat to the US’ information security and intellectual property, as well as its economic vitality, is China’s counterintelligence and economic espionage operations, Wray told a video event at the Hudson Institute in Washington. Beijing is engaged in a highly sophisticated and maligning foreign influence campaign, with methods that include bribery, blackmail and covert deals, he said. Giving an example, Wray said that when a US official
NEW HONG KONG LAW: A visit to Beijing-friendly nations or those with weak judicial systems could leave people at risk of deportation to China, a former MAC official said Beijing could request countries with which it has extradition agreements to deport Taiwanese to China to face criminal charges following the implementation of national security legislation for Hong Kong, a former Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) official warned yesterday. Some developing countries, and those close to China because of the Belt and Road Initiative, are likely to accommodate Beijing’s requests to extradite Taiwanese to China, said former deputy MAC minister Chen Ming-chi (陳明祺), who served from July 2, 2018, until May 20, and then returned to his former post as an assistant professor of sociology at National Tsing Hua University. While Taiwanese
RSS