A photo captures the screen of a Vietnamese website at: www.quangcaonghean.com/index.php that has been hacked by 1937CN team. According to a representative of Bkav, 220 websites of the country were hacked from May 8-11 and hackers have claimed to be from China.

The information was provided by Ngo Tuan Anh, deputy director of Bkav company's cyber security division.

Talking with Vietnam News yesterday, Anh reported that there were two major methods of hacking, comprising distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) and attacking servers to obtain passwords or changing the interfaces of websites.

"IT staff are now required to check on all the systems, such as checking ports and closing unnecessary ports. During this period, they should keep monitoring. If any extraordinary change occurs, they will have to cut the systems out of the Internet to lower the risk of being attacked. Besides, they need to prepare information on security firms to contact for help if necessary," Anh stated.

All the websites that were hacked in Vietnam belong to small enterprises and individuals. Many of them do not realise that they are under attack although indications of being hacked are still available on their websites.

Anh noted that these were only separate attacks carried out by some hacker groups. "The targets of hacking are small firms and agencies, so a cyber war has not taken place. We hope that the cyber community will calm down because if it is true, then both the sides will suffer loss," Anh added. "However, we are always ready to respond to the worst situation that might occur."