VietNamNet Bridge – The fact that VietNamNet online newspaper (Vietnamese version) was hacked two days ago on November 22, has put other websites in a state of alarm. Experts have urged organizations to protect themselves by applying comprehensive measures.

At 3 am of November 22, a team calling itself “Team Mosta”, exploited a security hole and made a defacing attack on VietNamNet. Several hours later, in a notice about the incident, the editorial board of VietNamNet affirmed that VietNamNet was trying to restore the system as soon as possible.

At 12 pm, it was accessible on VietNamNet, but obtaining access was very difficult, and the message “Server too busy” regularly appeared on the home page. Everything was back to normal by 4 pm of the same day, though some news links could not be restored.

Bui Binh Minh, Assistant to the Editor in Chief, said that 80 percent of the access capability and news have been restored. According to Minh, hackers penetrated the system through a security hole and then cleared all the data in the server. “It was clearly an act of sabotage,” Minh said.

Nguyen Minh Duc, a senior executive from Back Khoa Internet Security Centre (BKIS) said right after the trouble occurred, VietNamNet and BKIS joined forces to fix the trouble.

According to Duc, the method hackers used to attack VietNamNet is very familiar. Hackers seized control of the server of the website and then changed and cleared data.

VietNamNet is the first online newspaper in Vietnam that suffered the defacing attack. The incident has put all online newspapers and websites in Vietnam in a state of alert.

Taking precautions – the golden rule

Vo Dang Thien, Editor in Chief of Buu Dien Vietnam newspaper, said that the trouble with VietNamNet is worrysome. After the trouble Buu Dien Vietnam has to take more precautious steps to prevent bad things to come. Thien has requested relevant agencies to take urgent measures to find the culprits.

Pham Hieu, Deputy Editor in Chief of VnExpress, said that ensuring safety for the system is an especially important task for all newspapers. Therefore VnExpress’ network regulatory center has to regularly check the system and update system error fixing versions in order to take prevention. However, VnExpress was also once “touched” by hackers.

Agreeing with colleagues, Nguyen Tien Dat from VTC News online newspaper said: “No website is absolutely safe. Therefore, VTC News has to regularly check its source code and use a firewall in order to prevent hacks. Especially, we have to ask for the support from network security experts”.

Addressing the worries of online newspapers about the “hacker catastrophe” Vu Quoc Khanh, Director of the Vietnam Computer Emergency Response Team (VNCERT) under the Ministry of Information and Communication, said that about 30 percent of big and important websites in Vietnam were attacked last year.

Online newspapers should be ahead of hackers

Khanh said that in order to protect websites, system administrators need to update and supervise the number of visitors regularly. According to him, most of the owners of websites think that their technologies will be safe from attacks, but it is a blunder. “After a certain period, hackers can discover holes on websites through which they can penetrate the systems. In order to deal with that, administrators need to go one step ahead of hackers,” he said.

Khanh went on to say that surveys show that websites in Vietnam are facing a high risk of being attacked because the owners still do not have suitable procedures on information safety management.

Nguyen Minh Duc from BKIS said that all websites are likely to be attacked if they do not have comprehensive solutions from technologies to people.

On November 23, the Vietnam Information Security Association (Vnisa) released the result of a survey on information security in Vietnam in 2010. Most of the enterprises and institutions in Vietnam have increased their investments or maintained steady investments to ensure security information. However, they do not have standard procedures to respond to attacks. Many enterprises and institutions do not know if their networks have been attacked and how many times. Shockingly, 70 percent of institutions did not report the attacks to management agencies.

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