Friday, 3 September 2010
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Central Government
India targets Google and Skype on data security
First BlackBerry. Now Google and Skype. The government of India not only wants BlackBerry to build data centres within its borders so that its intelligence agencies can more easily monitor communications. It wants Google and Skype to do the same.
Security
Malaysia’s cyber defences ready for Independence Day
There is one week to go before Hari Medeka, Malaysia ...
Central Government
Ex-US GCIO warns on cloud security
In an interview with FutureGov, a former United States cabinet-level ...
22 July 2010 | News
Mobile security risks for the public sector
According to a survey published this week, the biggest digital security concerns among Asian citizens relate to their mobile devices. In an interview with FutureGov, a leading academic has urged governments to do more to educate citizens and public sector workers on the importance of information security on mobile devices.
20 July 2010 | News
Japan trials full-body scanners
Despite widespread concerns over privacy, Japan has started testing full-body scanners at its busiest airport. The tests come six months after security services failed to detect explosives concealed in a terrorist’s underwear on a US-bound aircraft from the Netherlands.
15 July 2010 | Spotlight
Environmental interference to security
As sophisticated security threats continue to rise, environmental factors have become a key issue impacting organisation’s ability to prevent and detect crime. FutureGov spoke to Mr Yoshikazu Hirano, General Manager - Security Solutions Asia Pacific, Sony Electronics Asia Pacific, about the technologies in high definition (HD) surveillance cameras that address these challenges.
8 June 2010 | News
India to launch e-passport services
A surge in demand for passport services has prompted the Government of India to undertake a pilot project to issue its citizens with e-passports.
7 June 2010 | News
Asia dominates global spam league
More than one third of the world’s spam originates from Asia, with India, South Korea and Vietnam in the top-five worst offending countries. However, spam coming from China has dramatically reduced, according to a Sophos report.
7 June 2010 | News
Asian govts push privacy awareness
The Commissioners of the Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities (APPA), constituting representatives from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Korea, and Hong Kong, celebrated the annual Privacy Awareness Week (PAW) by promoting a slew of initiatives aimed at informing the public about privacy concerns.
1 June 2010 | News
World’s largest public safety radio network planned
The Federal Agency for Digital Radio of Security Authorities and Organisations (BDBOS) in Germany is in the process of rolling out the world’s largest radio network for public safety.
20 May 2010 | News
Indian cities deploy smart surveillance
New Delhi State Police and Uttarkhand State Traffic Police have deployed an intelligent Security Operations Center (iSOC) in four of their cities in order to better monitor traffic. IP fixed and Pan, Tilt and Zoom (PTZ) cameras have been installed at a total of 40 locations across New Delhi, Dehradun, Kashipur, and Rudrapur.
7 May 2010 | News
Are you ready for the digital Big Bang?
Within the next decade, the volume of data amassed in the world will be equivalent to a stack of DVDs reaching halfway from earth to mars. Data streaming through cables and airwaves will amount to 35 trillion gigabytes by 2020, a 44-fold increase in the volume of information around today.
27 April 2010 | Feature
Securing the East Asia Games
Despite some niggling scepticism from the media, Hong Kong successfully staged the East Asian Games in December 2009. Wong Yuen-lee, the Games’ Director of Operations, reveals how communications, training and 60 contingency plans helped all go according to plan.
22 April 2010 | Spotlight
Why large format printing has a future
Even as disaster response teams begins to embrace smaller format devices that make operations more flexible and mobile, large format printing still plays an important role in how the public sector responds to emergency situations. So says Santiago Morera, the Vice President & General Manager of Hewlett Packard’s large format printing business.
20 April 2010 | News
Why CCTV is a priority for Asian homeland security
Surveillance technology continues to be a focus of Asian governments’ public safety strategies. Over 100 security professionals gathered at the fourth annual FutureCCTV Forum this week to discuss the most effective ways of using CCTV. Government officials from Hong Kong, Brunei and Singapore shared their experiences with FutureGov.
5 April 2010 | News
Are civil servants cut out for social media?
Most senior civil servants are Baby Boomers or Generation Xers, born at a time without the internet. But does this mean that web communities are too ‘young’ for top officials to operate in effectively? In interviews with FutureGov, government officials from Australia, Malaysia and the UK argue that although civil servants may not feel comfortable using social media to reach young citizens, the rewards are worth the risks.
23 March 2010 | News
Singapore bolsters cyber defences
Singapore is boosting the defences of its online critical infrastructure. Policy changes, technical controls and competency building measures will roll out this year in response to a growing cyber security threat that has seen South Korea and the United States hit by Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks in the last 12 months.
18 March 2010 | Feature
Unlocking efficiency at Changi Prison
The doors of Singapore’s maximum security correctional facility were unlocked for Robin Hicks and Kelly Ng to find out how technology has made one of Asia’s most high-tech jails more secure and efficient.
8 March 2010 | News
Are mobile devices secure enough for govt services?
More than 50 per cent of electronic government services are now delivered on mobile phones in South Korea, the world’s most advanced mobile telephony market. But are mobile devices secure enough to support government services? In an interview with FutureGov, Professor Cheol Oh, a member of the Presidential Committee for …
1 March 2010 | Spotlight
Supporting the Department of Homeland Security
How Motorola’s Federal Technical Centre handles radio support for new P25 digital radio systems, while ensuring top-notch radio communications for federal agencies.
24 February 2010 | Interview
Leveraging cloud to sustain 200Gbps attack traffic
With a proper mechanism and tools, governments should be able to better defend themselves against Denial-of-service attacks, which are becoming bigger and more frequent
21 February 2010 | News
New Korean IT Agency President reveals priorities
Korea’s National Computing and Information Agency has placed cloud computing technologies, green IT and information security as top three priorities for 2010. Newly appointed President Chang Kwang-soo revealed to FutureGov his five-pronged strategy for the challenges ahead.
21 February 2010 | News
Korea hails California’s govt IT strategy
The South Korean government’s Director of Green IT has described the government of California’s plan to cut the energy its IT operations use by 30 per cent by 2012 as “very aggressive” as Korea embarks on its own mission to reduce energy consumption from 40 ministries and agencies by 15 per cent by 2013.
19 February 2010 | News
Queensland Police rolls out building access ID cards
Queensland Police Service is the first police force in Australia to issue employees with new electronic ID cards which integrate access to the premise and network resources, the Police Media and Public Affairs Branch told FutureGov.
9 February 2010 | News
Interpol rebuffs calls for web police
Calls for the creation of an internet police force to tackle unprecedented levels of cyber crime have been rebuffed by the director of IT at Interpol in an interview with FutureGov. Noboru Nakatani, Director for Information Systems and Technology for the global police network Interpol said that setting up a net police would be “reinventing the wheel” and the …
9 February 2010 | News
Virtual reality technology saves lives
An accident in a nuclear or petro-chemical plant can result in the loss of many lives and millions of dollars. FutureGov spoke to Lee Jekwon, Technical Consultant, Invensys Operations Management about how virtual reality technologies can help reduce that risk.
8 February 2010 | News
China clamps down "biggest hacker training base"
Police say that the web site, which was investigated after a few serious cyber attacks, had provided training to more than 180,000 individuals
5 February 2010 | News
Tweeting officials warned about security risks
Tweeting government officials with Facebook pages and LinkedIn accounts beware. The volume of spam and malware sent via social networking sites increased by 70 per cent last year, with MySpace, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter all falling victim to rising levels of malicious activity in 2009. Of them all, Facebook poses the biggest risk to security, according to a survey by cyber security firm Sophos.
2 February 2010 | News
World’s first CCTV Regulator appointed
The world’s first CCTV regulator is coming to Singapore to take the pulse of Asia’s security industry.
19 January 2010 | Interview
What are government’s security weak spots?
Microsoft’s global public safety and national security head Tim Bloechl has a Facebook account, but doesn’t trust social media as a reliable source of intelligence. Not yet anyway. When confronted with a threat to public safety, dealing with it should be second nature. So says Tim Bloechl, Microsoft’s Managing Director for Worldwide Public Safety and National Security.
11 January 2010 | Spotlight
Future of CCTV blends old with new
For many years, analogue CCTV systems have been the only video surveillance option in the market. It is only in recent years that video surveillance became digitised and equipped with many technologies and functions which the analogue CCTV systems could not provide to users previously.
4 January 2010 | News
Agency walls too high for US Cyber Security Czar?
Howard Schmidt, the newly appointed United States Cyber Security Coordinator, faces the daunting challenge of ensuring that different government agencies cooperate on cyber security issues, a senior government official has told FutureGov.
11 December 2009 | News
Hong Kong Police act over peer-to-peer data leakage
The territory’s personal data privacy watchdog said he was satisfied with the measures taken to mitigate the consequences and prevent reoccurrence of the recent leakage cases where confidential police documents appeared on the internet through a peer-to-peer file shairng application
30 November 2009 | News
Slow progress by Philippine relief efforts
Recovery in The Philippines from the three consecutive typhoons has been slow. A month has passed but close to 382,000 victims still need rescuing from their flooded homes, according to the United Nations.
30 November 2009 | News
Crossing Hong Kong-Macau border made easy
Hong Kong residents will soon be able to enter Macau through electronic auto-clearance gates using their Hong Kong ID cards while those living in Macau will have the same privilege, according to a joint agreement by the two governments.
27 October 2009 | News
Security officials ponder use of social media
Government officials from Australia and Singapore have admitted that there is much to be done to understand how social media can be used to gather intelligence on security matters from the public, at a security event organised by FutureGov in Singapore last week.
23 October 2009 | News
'Govt 2.0 should come with health warning'
Governments need to be more wary of the security risks posed by the consumerisation of the internet and the changing working habits of the public sector work force. So senior executives at global cyber security firms have warned civil servants in interviews with FutureGov.
14 October 2009 | News
IMPACT boss warns of long struggle with cyber crime
Datuk Mohd Noor Amin, the Chairman of the International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats, or IMPACT, has warned governments of the “long-term struggle” with cyber criminality and the need for international cooperation to fight it.
30 September 2009 | Spotlight
Prevention is ALWAYS better than cure
What is Data Loss Prevention and why should companies in Asia Pacific care?
22 September 2009 | News
Winning the war against cyber crime
What are governments doing to ensure that critical online operations remain operational when under attack from cyber criminals? FutureGov asked senior civil servants in Taiwan, Hong Kong, China and the Philippines to reveal how they are preparing their defences against hackers.
15 September 2009 | Spotlight
How to get better value security: Symantec
A scattered approach to enterprise security is problematic. It’s costly to implement, a pain to manage, and not as effective as it needs to be.
8 September 2009 | News
US cyber security system sparks privacy row
A new version of a computer intrusion detection system being developed by the United States Department of Homeland Security has raised concerns from advocacy groups over privacy and the involvement of the National Security Agency (NSA) in the development of the software. The new system, known as Einstein 3, can reportedly read email as well as its original function, to detect malicious software.
3 September 2009 | News
Taiwan fake govt web site saga remedied in one hour
The sabotage of a Taiwan government web site by hackers last month was dealt with by the authorities in just one hour, and the perpetrators have now been caught, according to Liu Tian-cai, Administrative Court Commissioner for the Central Personnel Administration (CPU), the agency that came under attack.
1 September 2009 | Spotlight
How to turn risk into return: Symantec
How IT governance, risk management, and compliance drive better business outcomes
25 August 2009 | Spotlight
How to weather the storm: Symantec
Making IT Work in Tough Times—and Coming Out Ahead
11 August 2009 | News
Taiwanese hackers create fake govt web site
Hackers in Taiwan have exploited the turmoil caused by last week’s typhoons by creating a fake home page for the web site of the Central Personnel Administration (CPA), the government department responsible for advising citizens on whether or not conditions are safe enough to go to work or school.
11 August 2009 | News
US cybersecurity guidelines come under fire
A new set of guidelines on cybersecurity released by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the United States has fallen short of the protection needed for government systems, a cybersecurity analysis group has warned.
29 July 2009 | News
HK expands cyber centre network
A pilot scheme to roll out District-Based Cyber Centres (DCCs) is to be expanded in Hong Kong as part of the government’s Digital 21 Strategy, which aims to give needy residents throughout the territory access to information and communications technology (ICT).
27 July 2009 | News
China and UK cooperate on network security
The Chinese State Council Information Office and the UK’s Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have agreed to combine their efforts to safeguard national network security and collaborate on information sharing and intelligence gathering.
20 July 2009 | News
Japanese netizens fret about internet safety
Eighty per cent of Japanese internet users feel are worried about their privacy and feel insecure when using the web, according to the results of a government survey.
13 July 2009 | News
US and Korean govt web sites attacked
Cyber attacks assumed to be launched from North Korea disrupted United States and South Korean government and key private sector websites last week.
30 June 2009 | News
NSW Police installs image management system
The police force of New South Wales (NSW) has implemented Australia’s first large scale digital imagery management system to save law enforcers time.
5 January 2006 | News
Candid camera: CCTV and the value of situational awareness
As events in London last year have demonstrated, CCTV is a technology whose time has come. Report: James Smith.
22 September 2005 | News
UK unveils biometric standards for ID cards
The BS ISO/IEC 19794 series of standards cover the science of using “biological properties” to identify individuals, such as fingerprints, iris scans and facial recognition.
9 November 2004 | News
E-government and the surveillance society?
The fight against terrorism, and the data requirements of e-government, raise the issue of finding the right balance between security and privacy, writes Thomas Riley.
23 April 2004 | News
British police forces deploy new handsets
Seven British Police Forces have decided to jointly deploy a new digital handset to their officers on the national public safety network. Report: Edmund Tan.
7 April 2004 | News
London's wirelessly-controlled CCTV
Westminster City Council is set to transform the heart of London into a Wireless City. Report: James Smith.
24 February 2004 | News
From disappearing boundaries to security governance
Two seemingly contradictory movements have recently appeared on the IT landscape, writes Philippe Langlois.
28 December 2003 | News
Moving your Malware strategy out of the dark ages
It’s time to review your organisation’s approach to external threats to your network, says Greg Day.
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Better learning with web 2.0 and virtual worlds
In a visit to Ngee Ann Secondary School yesterday (22 July), FutureGov found students deeply ...
Will Facebook profiles replace govt web sites?
It’s all the rage for ministries and agencies to have a Facebook pages these ...
Singapore awards US$144m EHR contract
A consortium made up by Accenture, Oracle, and Orion Health has won Singapore’s National ...