The Latest in IT Security

By Tim Kelly and Nobuhiro Kubo TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan faces a full-on cyber attack across government departments on Tuesday in a drill aimed at bolstering national security as the country gears up to host the 2020 Olympics. Japan is following the lead of Britain, which invited ethical hackers to test its computer systems in the run up to the 2012 London Olympics. Some 50 cyber defense specialists will gather at an emergency response center in Tokyo, with at least three times that many offsite, to defend against a simulated attack across 21 state ministries and agencies and 10 industry associations, said Ikuo Misumi, a hacking expert at Japans state-run National Information Security Centre. Its not that we havent put effort into cybersecurity, but we are certainly behind the U.S., Ichita Yamamoto, the cabinet minister in charge of IT policy and who is leading the effort to boost cybersecurity, said in an interview.