The interior Ministry\u2019s Anti-Cybercrime Department director Chea Pov confirms that Cambodia\u2019s much-touted cybercrime law has yet to be finalised.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are more debates to take place and more meetings, but it takes time to amend the law according to the threats to the Cambodian people,\u201d he says, adding that it would affect people using internet-connected devices.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Because] the law is still under operation, I can\u2019t say more,\u201d he stresses. The Kingdom is still trailing behind regional partners who have either introduced specific legislation to cope with the rising threat of cybercrime or have amended existing laws to include the criminal use of data and devices.<\/p>\n
Criminal means<\/strong><\/p>\n However, the efficacy of cybercrime laws introduced by neighbouring countries is worth questioning, according to Amirudin Abdul Wahab, chief executive officer of CyberSecurity Malaysia and and expert with 20 years of experience in the business.<\/p>\n \u201cCross-border cyber-attacks and criminal activities have introduced several legal challenges. Laws are to protect national security interests within well-defined geographical boundaries,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n He cites differing laws on hot-button issues such as freedom of speech \u2013 what is acceptable in one country could be considered libellous and defamatory in countries with fewer rights.<\/p>\n Compounding the issue is the difficulty of gathering evidence [from] outside national borders, which can be expensive, time-consuming and almost impossible without full cooperation of the host state, especially for a country such as Cambodia with limited resources.<\/p>\n \u201cAs such, most current laws are of limited effectiveness in addressing transnational cybercrimes,\u201d concludes Amirudin.<\/p>\n Amirudin is not alone in his concerns regarding the implementation of legislation.<\/p>\n While he notes that the means of tackling cybercrime are forced to adapt in lockstep with the evolution of criminal means, for Dr Mark van Staalduinen, a cybersecurity expert with TNO \u2013 the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research \u2013 cybercriminals are increasingly seeking higher value targets.<\/p>\n \u201cFirst, be aware that every organisation can be a target,\u201d he says, warning that \u201cof course a bank is of more interest to a cybercriminal than small or medium enterprises, but ransomware attacks and many other cybercriminal concepts can affect your organisation and benefit the criminals.\u201d<\/p>\n For van Staalduinen, the issue of what will be targeted and by whom is tied intrinsically to the profitability of cybercrime \u2013 the more economically developed a nation becomes, the more of a target it inadvertently paints on its back.<\/p>\n \u201cIt depends on the target organisation for the attack wherefrom it originates, but it is well known that state actors are participating in the global cyberwarfare as well,\u201d claims van Staalduinen.<\/p>\n \u201cFurthermore, cybercriminals with economic or terrorist motives, script kiddies and unintentional cyber failures contribute to the battlefield as well,\u201d he says, referring to the growing number of inexperienced hackers \u2013 \u201cscript kiddies\u201d \u2013 who use computer programmes designed by other, more experienced coders to launch cyberattacks against computer systems or websites.<\/p>\n Origin of threats<\/strong><\/p>\n US-based cyber threat intelligence firm IntSights Cyber Intelligence Inc reported earlier this year that Cambodia had been the victim of multiple cyberattacks.<\/p>\n Although this is not new, Kapsersky Labs recorded some 4.5 million web attacks and 21.9 million offline threats in Cambodia last year alone. Online attacks more than doubled from 2017 but what IntSights discovered was that certain attacks appeared to be state-sponsored.<\/p>\n Attacks committed by OceanLotus \u2013 a group of cybercriminals otherwise known as APT32 \u2013 have been recorded since 2014, predominantly focusing their efforts in Southeast Asia, but more recently specifically in Cambodia according to a 2019 threat briefing from IntSights.<\/p>\n \u201cOceanLotus carried out cyberattacks against foreign governments that could conceivably threaten Vietnam\u2019s economic growth, namely Cambodia,\u201d reads the report.<\/p>\n \u201cLast year\u2019s watering hole campaign targeted a number of Cambodian government sites, such as the Defense Ministry and Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation,\u201d IntSights reported, referring to the tactic of cybercriminals to infect a website known to be used by their end targets and gaining access to their computer systems once the infected website is visited.<\/p>\n \u2018Eliminating competition\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n The report seemingly suggests a link between OceanLotus to state-sponsored cyberwarfare, with the view that \u201cEliminating economic competition appears to be a primary motive for OceanLotus, indicating a high likelihood they could be associated with the Vietnamese government.\u201d<\/p>\n Intsights also notes an alleged connection with Vietnam\u2019s recent cybersecurity laws, which have been decried by human rights groups, free speech activists and technology companies as draconian and repressive. The move might even have led to a growing number of Vietnamese internet users turning to the \u201cdark\u201d web in search of unfiltered internet access.<\/p>\n This, IntSights suspects, is fuelling the growth of a cybercriminal hub in Vietnam as more internet users learn the tools necessary to evade the one-party nation\u2019s tightening grip on information. Although there\u2019s naturally nothing new about the employment of cyberwarfare to gain economic advantages, Cambodia\u2019s vulnerability to rapidly advancing neighbouring countries raises bigger questions about the Kingdom\u2019s means to defend itself.<\/p>\n Potential for cybercriminals<\/strong><\/p>\n Shamane Tan, executive advisor to Privasec for Asia and the Pacific \u2013 an Australian governance and cybersecurity firm \u2013 warns of the growing sophistication in cybercrime, as well as the well-documented increase in volume.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the 2019 Global Threat Report released by CrowdStrike, a threat graph showed a capture of 240 billion events every 24 hours, which is more than the number of tweets Twitter processes in an entire year,\u201d she says via email.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I were to look at the cybersecurity industry itself, there has been increasing talk and adoption of the MITRE ATT&CK framework to describe the tactics and techniques in a standardised manner,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n The MITRE ATT&CK knowledge base is a compilation of all known tactics, tools and methods of cyberattacks, but offers simplified, standardised information in a bid to make comprehension of cybersecurity more accessible.<\/p>\n On the issue of state-sponsored cyberwarfare, Tan notes that technological developments have emboldened certain state actors.<\/p>\n \u201cUsual suspects of state-sponsored attacks remain the same as previous years. However, in the breakout time comparison, Russia-based threat actors are almost eight times as fast as North Korea-based adversaries, who themselves are almost twice as fast as intrusion groups from China,\u201d she says. This means that, in recent years, the time it takes a hacker group from gaining initial access to a victim\u2019s computer, to moving laterally through its network is getting shorter.<\/p>\n \u201cKnowing this, organisations can then adjust their target response time taking into context the likely adversaries they will confront given their business sector and regional focus,\u201d explains Tan.<\/p>\n Cambodia is ill-equipped<\/strong><\/p>\n As such, it\u2019s unlikely that the introduction of new legislation will do much to protect Cambodian businesses, financial institutions or government assets \u2013 not without a robust and dedicated body of cybersecurity professionals.<\/p>\n Most experts in Cambodia agree this does not exist yet.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we see today on the cybersecurity market in Southeast Asia is not just a looming possibility of the lack of cybersecurity experts, but the factual shortage of professionals,\u201d says a spokesperson for Group-IB, a Singapore-based cybersecurity software firm.<\/p>\n \u201cAsia\u2019s fruitful economic development has made it an attractive target for financially motivated hackers and state-sponsored hacker groups. The existing pool of cybersecurity researchers in the region is simply not enough to deal with the constantly growing number of cybercrimes, whose sophistication has been steadily increasing,\u201d warns Group-IB.<\/p>\n The firm recommends awareness-raising and education activities and, in particular, the training of Cambodian youths in the basics of cybersecurity best practices. These best practices often go ignored by even Cambodian government staff who have been known to use personal email addresses for official business.<\/p>\n \u201cThe bringing up of a cyber-savvy workforce in the region has been a cornerstone of Group-IB\u2019s strategy, which is being implemented in close cooperation with universities of the region that adopt the company\u2019s materials for internal courses and send their students to undertake internships at Group-IB.\u201d<\/p>\n Amirudin Abdul Wahab, Dr Mark van Staalduinen and Shamane Tan will be among numerous esteemed guest speakers at the Cyber Security Asia 2019 conference in Phnom Penh on Nov 4 and 5.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The interior Ministry\u2019s Anti-Cybercrime Department director Chea Pov confirms that Cambodia\u2019s much-touted cybercrime law has yet to be finalised.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2757,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"defense.gov","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":null,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":null,"footnotes":""},"categories":[258],"tags":[630,629],"yoast_head":"\n