A hacker group calling itself "revengetheplanet" has attacked 156
Web sites hosted by Vietnam's largest ISP and monopoly Internet
gateway provider, Vietnam Data Communications (VDC).
A foreign Internet services company in Vietnam monitored the
intrusions. The company did not want to be publicly named as
authorities have accused it of collusion in this attack and an
earlier attack in August that erased 60 VDC-hosted Web sites.
The hackers, believed to be US-based, replaced the contents of the
mainly Government-linked Web sites with abuse about the weak level
of Internet security maintained by VDC. Many of the hacked sites
were down for 10 hours, as the hackers were also able to erase
poorly-secured backup content.
Apart from a number of VDC's own sites, the hackers hit VDC-hosted
sites belonging to Vietnamese government organisations such as the
State Security Commission, the Communist Party umbrella group
Vietnam Fatherland Front, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and
Industry, and the Ministry of Education and Training. The hackers
said they left alone a VDC-hosted site called Cuu Tro Tre Em Tan
Tat (Handicapped Children Relief).
Vietnam has five state-owned ISPs, of which VDC, a subsidiary of
the telecoms monopoly carrier Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications,
is the largest. VDC also controls the country's Internet gateways.
All Web sites in the country must be hosted on Government-approved
servers, and there are strict regulations defining what content is
acceptable.
The Vietnamese government has approved plans to create an
"electronic government" using the Internet, and has also said it
wants to open up the Internet services market to private companies.
The Government has said it encourages private Internet use and
urges businesses to use e-commerce. Currently, around 0.2% of
Vietnam's population have Internet subscriptions, and Web sites set
up in Vietnam number only a few hundred.