Translated and compiled by Bing-sheng Lee

On May 11, the Ministry of Traffic and Communications (MOTC) said Taiwan is suffering frequent cyber attacks from China. Amid millions of attacks each year, the scale is one of the largest in the world and reaching a quasi-war.

The National Information and Communication Security Center says that the government has the situation under control.

The MOTC says that most of the attacks originate from China. According to its statistics, Chinese hackers have infiltrated Taiwan’s national defense, diplomatic core, utilities, air traffic control and telecommunications for at least ten years.

To acquire more information about Taiwan’s national defense, politics and diplomacy, the hackers have shifted targets from government administration to private think tanks, telecommunications operators and corporations.

The MOTC believes that cyber attacks may be reaching into Taiwan’s key infrastructure and individuals, stealing private information and data such as the projects of political parties, analysis of commercial trade and academic research.

The government believes it is necessary to form a so-called fourth military branch, which aims to protect Taiwan’s key infrastructure from cyber attacks by terrorists and hacker groups.

Hsiao Hsiu-chin, chief of the Information and Communication Security Center under the Executive Yuan, says Taiwan has suffered many cyber attacks, but the overall situation is under the government’s control.

Kuomintang legislator Johnny Chiang asked Hsiao to talk about the measures the government would take if a major cyber attack occurred. Hsiao answered that the government categorizes cyber attacks into four levels with level four being a quasi-war situation and so far there has been no attack listed as level four.

Deputy Minister of National Defense Cheng De-mei says that cyber attacks are a major problem and can greatly affect national defense and traffic control.

New Power Party legislator Freddy Lim points out that Chinese hackers attack Taiwan more than seven million times a year, which is a number confirmed by Cheng.

Edited by Edward White

Sources:
Central Daily News
CRNTT
TNL
“Scale of cyber attacks on Taiwan reaches ‘quasi war’ level: MOTC” (Focus Taiwan)