Despite growing the cybersecurity threat, personnel shortages are hampering efforts to boost security measures, the director of the Executive Yuan’s Department of Cybersecurity said yesterday.
While the Cabinet proposed a draft cybersecurity bill in April to protect government agencies, eight “key infrastructures” — energy and water resources, transportation, information and telecommunications, science parks, emergency medical facilities and financial facilities — as well as state-run and government-funded organizations, it lacks the personnel to improve and implement security measures, Director Chien Hung-wei (簡宏偉) told a news conference at the Executive Yuan.
The department will cooperate with the ministries of education and economic affairs, as well as the National Development Council to recruit and train 500 specialists, Chien said.
The nation is faced with increasing cybersecurity threats, especially to the public and financial sectors, Chien said.
He cited several incidents this year such as last month’s US$60 million cyberheist from Far Eastern International Bank — most of which has been recovered — a ransomware attack on six securities brokers in February and a leak of personal information from security breaches of Bureau of Consular Affairs’ overseas offices that same month.
Cybersecurity threats, of which there have been 167 this year, largely stem from ransomware and from large-scale denial-of-service attacks on Internet of Things devices, he said.
“The department will improve the government information security network by drawing from data analytics and artificial intelligence [AI] technology to predict and detect cyberattacks,” Chien said.
Premier William Lai (賴清德) has told the Cabinet to tighten protection of the financial and telecommunication sectors and key infrastructures such as water and power plants and boost data security awareness of public employees.
The government this year launched a four-year NT$4.44 billion (US$147 million) “flagship information security program,” with NT$926 million allocated for security improvement next year.
Additional funds can also be drawn from the Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Program, if necessary, to improve information security, the Cabinet said.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
US President Donald Trump said "it’s up to" Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be "very unhappy" with a change in the "status quo," the New York Times said in an interview published yesterday. Xi "considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing," Trump told the newspaper on Wednesday. "But I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that," he added. "I hope he doesn’t do that." Trump made the comments in
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
RSS