HKCERT Territory-wide Drill Targets Web Forum Phishing Scams

With increasing phishing scams on popular web forums being discovered, the local information security watchdog, the Hong Kong Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Centre (HKCERT), recently (4 November 2011) conducted a territory-wide drill to raise the preparedness of the administrators of local web forums in handling such threats.

According to HKCERT, managed by the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC), the total number of phishing cases reported to the centre has increased steadily by around 13% per annum, from 232 in 2008 to 298 in 2010.

Mr Roy Ko, Principal Consultant (IT Industry Development) of HKPC and Manager of HKCERT, said, “The alarming trend urgently demands collective efforts to handle messages with malicious links and to take appropriate action against the perpetrators.”

With “Handling Phishing Scams on Web Forum” being the theme of the drill, various scenarios of phishing messages were simulated which required immediate actions by participating organizations. They included the Hong Kong Police, the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer, and key players in the web forum community (Appendix for Full List).

The drill successfully identified and contained simulated phishing messages in the web forums and traced them to their source. It also tested the incident handling procedures of various parties.

Mr Ko noted that, “While participants have found the drill a useful exercise, we have identified a number of areas for further improvement. It was also encouraging that some major forums and their members are quick to respond to these simulated threats.”

For more details about the drill, please contact HKCERT at tel: (852) 8105 6060, fax: (852) 8105 9760 and e-mail: hkcert@hkcert.org or visit the webpage: http://www.hkcert.org/. For other media enquiries, please contact Mr Felix Chan of HKPC at tel.: (852) 2788 5036 or email: felixchan@hkpc.org.

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Mr Jonathan Ho
General Manager
Corporate Communications
Tel: (852) 2788 6390
Fax: (852) 2788 5056
Email: jonathanho@hkpc.org
Website: www.hkpc.org

7 November 2011

Mr Roy Ko, Principal Consultant (IT Industry Development) of HKPC and Manager of HKCERT, (second from left) monitors the drill at the command centre with representatives of the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer