HKCERT

The Hong Kong Computer Emergency Response Team was launched at the end of February with HK$10.7 million from the government's Innovation and Technology Fund and will be operated by the Hong Kong Productivity Council. Similar to CERTs in other countries, the organization's mission is to collect information relating to computer security such as the latest viruses, security weaknesses and counter-measures, and disseminate them to the public. It will focus on the needs of the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

It is absolutely necessary to have a CERT in major IT centres; it provides a vital coordination role and will act as a trusted source of information and alerts for the Internet using public and organizations. This move fits well with the Governments plans to make Hong Kong a regional IT hub. Large organizations can also form CERTs for their internal needs.