What to do to secure digital data?

Hai Duong Department of Information and Communications presides over and coordinates the organization of a practical exercise to ensure network information security in 2023. Photo: Ha Kien

Many risks

According to the Department of Cyber ​​Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention (Provincial Police), in recent times, the number of cyber criminals attacking malware to sabotage and steal data has tended to increase. However, the technical infrastructure of most agencies and units in the province is old and outdated. Some equipment and software have expired, have many security holes, and are not supported for updates, leading to information insecurity. Some Party committees and leaders of units have not fully recognized the importance of ensuring information security and safety. Regulations and procedures on information security work of some units are still lacking or sketchy, and have not been fully and seriously implemented.

According to the leader of Hai Duong Department of Health, regarding Project 06, the sector is carrying out a number of tasks such as using chip-embedded citizen identification cards to replace health insurance cards in medical examination and treatment, issuing online health certificates to serve the online issuance and renewal of driver's licenses, but currently the information infrastructure system of medical facilities is still limited, lacking specialized staff in charge. Managing and handling issues related to digital data and information technology is facing many difficulties.

This is also a common situation that many agencies and units face. Due to the lack of specialized staff with qualifications and experience, digitization and information processing are confusing, easily causing data leakage and loss of agencies, units as well as people.

Mr. Hoang Quoc Hung in Quang Liet Street (Hai Duong City) shared: "Currently, most of the information and documents of individuals and families are digitized and uploaded to the system such as citizen identification cards, birth certificates, household registration books, land documents, driver's licenses, health insurance cards... If not kept confidential and secure, it will greatly affect people's lives."

Currently, many people using online public services are still concerned about the security of personal information.

Along with that, most levels and sectors lack equipment to ensure security and information storage requirements. The Department of Justice is promoting the digitization of civil status data to upload to the national database system. During working hours, the team of judicial officials at the commune level can both handle work on computers at the "one-stop" department and on personal computers. If not careful, information can easily be leaked or exploited by criminals.

Security at every level

Faced with high information security requirements, during the implementation of Project 06, the Provincial People's Committee and the Project 06 Task Force always attach importance to this task and assign the Department of Information and Communications to preside over and coordinate the implementation. This Department is responsible for advising the Provincial People's Committee to lead and direct the development of a strong enough team of cybersecurity experts to promptly monitor, coordinate, handle and overcome incidents of cybersecurity and high-tech crimes.

As a unit that is managing a huge amount of digital data of citizens, in recent times, Hai Duong Provincial Police has paid attention to implementing the task of information security. The Provincial Police have deployed a private, internal transmission line down to the commune level, with a centralized monitoring system. All equipment put into use has been checked for information security, affixed with inspection stamps, and computer systems have been installed with security and encryption software according to regulations. Along with that, a Network Security and Information Security Inspection Team has been established to implement Project 06 every 3 months for all 235 commune-level police agencies.

To secure information, according to Mr. Tran Quoc Khanh, Deputy Director of VNPT Hai Duong Business Center, each agency, unit, and locality needs to identify and implement plans for each level of information; strengthen monitoring to detect early and remotely information security incidents for timely response and resolution.

Danh Trung