Supporting the Internet Security in ASIA PACIFIC
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Background

With the rapid development of the Internet, many Asia Pacific economies are now increasingly dependent on public network applications such as online banking, online stock trading, e-business, e-government and e-customs. The protection of the various national information infrastructures that make up this new and emerging Asia Pacific e-economy is critical to the region's political and economic stability and security. The need to protect these critical national information infrastructures is also urgent.

Attacks on information infrastructures are increasing in frequency, sophistication and scale. For example, the Code Red II Internet worm integrated characteristics of a computer virus, Trojan, Worm and Hacking activity to propagate quickly across the Internet and infect massive numbers of host computers. Code Red II was fully automated to search for hosts to infect with no respect for national or international boundaries. Subsequent worms such as Nimda also illustrate this recent and concerning trend.

This growing threat in the Asia Pacific region requires a collaborative approach with the various CERT and CSIRT organizations taking the lead role with full support from their respective governments.

To address this urgent need, Asia Pacific Incident Response Teams propose the establishment of a group called Asia Pacific CERT (APCERT). APCERT would have an operational focus and be open to all suitably qualified CERTs and CSIRTs in the Asia Pacific region.