The Presidential Office has allegedly issued directives to its employees barring them from using the Google search engine as well as online social networking sites such as MSN and Facebook to avoid becoming the victims of hackers, reports said yesterday.
In addition, an employee at the Presidential Office said on condition of anonymity, that staff could not use Gmail at work, as they all had Presidential Office e-mail accounts.
Despite the directive regarding Gmail accounts, the source said employees who had special work-related requirements, such as the need to contact a large group of people such as reporters, could apply for permission.
“It [the directive] is mainly for security reasons,” the source said.
The same rule applied to MSN and YouTube, while Facebook was entirely forbidden, the source said, adding that he was still able to access Google from his office computer.
The Chinese-language United Daily News reported yesterday that an individual had recently sent a letter to the Presidential Office Web site complaining about a response from the Presidential Office, which told the person that it could not link to a YouTube image she had sent because Presidential Office staff were not allowed to access YouTube.
In addition to YouTube, the -report said that Presidential Office employees were also not allowed to access Facebook, MSN, YahooKimo and Google.
James Buu (卜正?民), deputy director of the Public Affairs Office of the Presidential Office, said presidential staff should be able to use Google, but that Gmail access was forbidden without special permission.
Buu denied that access to YouTube had been banned, saying it was allowed again after the new Presidential Office Web site was launched in June.
As for Facebook, Buu said that while, for reasons unclear, he had had a hard time logging in, some colleagues had succeeded.
Buu said staff at the Presidential Office had been careful with potential hacker attacks and scrupulous after the new Web site was launched. If a hack is identified, the problem must be resolved within two hours, he said.
“We are using the least amount of money in return for the best protection,” he said.
The redesign of the Presidential Office Web site cost between NT$6 million (US$187,000) and NT$7 nillion.
The report also said the Executive Yuan was under constant hacker attacks, with an average of 22,000 junk mail every day. About 500 attacks were identified every month, or 20 per day, it said.
An employee at the Executive Yuan who asked not to be named said staff had not been able to access MSN for a long time. However, Google, Facebook and Gmail and other e-mail services could be accessed.
She said that although she did not dare ask why MSN could not be accessed, she suspected supervisors did not want employees to spend time during office hours social networking over the Internet.
Twenty-four Republican members of the US House of Representatives yesterday introduced a concurrent resolution calling on the US government to abolish the “one China” policy and restore formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Led by US representatives Tom Tiffany and Scott Perry, the resolution calls for not only re-establishing formal relations, but also urges the US Trade Representative to negotiate a free-trade agreement (FTA) with Taiwan and for US officials to advocate for Taiwan’s full membership in the UN and other international organizations. In a news release announcing the resolution, Tiffany, who represents a Wisconsin district, called the “one China” policy “outdated, counterproductive
Actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has “returned home” to Taiwan, and there are no plans to hold a funeral for the TV star who died in Japan from influenza- induced pneumonia, her family said in a statement Wednesday night. The statement was released after local media outlets reported that Barbie Hsu’s ashes were brought back Taiwan on board a private jet, which arrived at Taipei Songshan Airport around 3 p.m. on Wednesday. To the reporters waiting at the airport, the statement issued by the family read “(we) appreciate friends working in the media for waiting in the cold weather.” “She has safely returned home.
ON PAROLE: The 73-year-old suspect has a criminal record of rape committed when he was serving in the military, as well as robbery and theft, police said The Kaohsiung District Court yesterday approved the detention of a 73-year-old man for allegedly murdering three women. The suspect, surnamed Chang (張), was arrested on Wednesday evening in connection with the death of a 71-year-old woman surnamed Chao (趙). The Kaohsiung City Police Department yesterday also unveiled the identities of two other possible victims in the serial killing case, a 75-year-old woman surnamed Huang (黃), the suspect’s sister-in-law, and a 75-year-old woman surnamed Chang (張), who is not related to the suspect. The case came to light when Chao disappeared after taking the suspect back to his residence on Sunday. Police, upon reviewing CCTV
TRUMP ERA: The change has sparked speculation on whether it was related to the new US president’s plan to dismiss more than 1,000 Joe Biden-era appointees The US government has declined to comment on a post that indicated the departure of Laura Rosenberger as chair of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT). Neither the US Department of State nor the AIT has responded to the Central News Agency’s questions on the matter, after Rosenberger was listed as a former chair on the AIT’s official Web site, with her tenure marked as 2023 to this year. US officials have said previously that they usually do not comment on personnel changes within the government. Rosenberger was appointed head of the AIT in 2023, during the administration of former US president Joe