Taiwan not only faces military intimidation from China, but is also on the front line of global cybersecurity threats, and it is taking action to counter those attacks, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday.
Speaking at the opening of this year’s Cybersec Expo in Taipei, the president assured foreign diplomats and exhibitors that Taiwan remained committed to strengthening its defense against cyberattacks and enhancing the resilience of its digital infrastructure.
Lai referenced a report from the National Security Bureau (NSB) indicating that the Government Service Network faced an average of 2.4 million intrusion attempts daily last year, more than double the figure from 2023.
Photo: screen grab from the Presidential Office’s Flickr page
The NSB report focused on cyberattacks by Chinese state-backed hackers targeting government agencies, the high-tech sector and critical infrastructure in Taiwan.
Under the National Cybersecurity Strategy unveiled last week, the government would continue to build up the resilience of Taiwanese society, promote the industry’s ecosystem and develop new technologies for emerging risks, Lai said.
The strategy outlines the government’s plans and objectives for addressing pervasive cybersecurity risks over the next few years.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
American Institute in Taiwan Director Raymond Greene said that Taiwan ranked at the top in the Asia-Pacific region in terms of cybersecurity threat volume, citing data from US-based cybersecurity firm FortiGuard Labs.
A report by FortiGuard Labs indicated that there were 412 billion malicious threats detected across the Asia-Pacific region in the first half of 2023, with 55 percent of those targeting Taiwan, Greene said.
He said the partnership between the US and Taiwan in the cybersecurity sector was therefore critical because no economy or government could tackle such challenges alone.
The Cybersec Expo, which runs until tomorrow, brings together more than 400 cybersecurity brands to showcase their latest technologies and solutions, organizers said.
The three-day event also includes about 300 talks, featuring speakers such as Jan Bartosek, deputy speaker of the Czech Chamber of Deputies, and Jason Vogt, an assistant professor at the US Naval War College.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
Taiwan is still in the process of assessing the possibility of recruiting workers from Eswatini, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, adding that its goal is to help Eswatini upgrade its vocational training centers. If there are plans to recruit workers from Eswatini, safeguarding national security, protecting public health and ensuring the employment rights of Taiwanese would be prerequisites, Department of West Asian and African Affairs Director-General Yen Chia-liang (顏嘉良) told a news conference. Key considerations would also include filling labor shortages in specific industries, and fostering bilateral professional and technical exchanges, he said. Yen was asked about the progress of labor
A US uncrewed surface vessel (USV) encountered multiple Chinese warships during an autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait, US defense company Seasats said in a statement on Wednesday. Seasats announced that a Lightfish USV had completed the first autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait. Over five days, the USV traversed the entire length of the Strait while constantly monitoring surface vessel traffic, the company said. The Lightfish encountered multiple Chinese warships, one of which was a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Type 056 corvette, it said. The Chinese vessels were operating “well within Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone without transmitting their identity via the
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
RSS