Is Vietnam the next haven for cybercrime? The country is apparently facing a major Internet security crisis, with some 95% of its PCs infected with viruses and 40% of its stock brokerages vulnerable to attack, according to officials there.

Officials from Vietnam’s Public Security Ministry told attendees at a security conference held there this week that security and data protection are at risk due to limited investment and spending on IT and security, as well a lack of awareness among users of Internet security threats, according to the People’s Daily Online.

“The risk of data and network security breaches is at an alarming rate. According to reports of BKIS (a leading local network security center in Vietnam) and VNCERT (Vietnam Computer Emergency Response Team) under the country’s Ministry of Information and Communications, in 2007, some 25 percent of major Vietnamese Websites are vulnerable to hackers’ attacks, and 95 percent of personal computers were infected with viruses,” said Dang Van Hieu, deputy minister of public security at the conference.

The ministry reportedly found security vulnerabilities in 140 Websites of key agencies and companies in Vietnam, including Websites with the domain “gov.vn” containing malware from foreign attackers, according to Nguyen Viet The, an official with the Ministry’s department of technology.

Last year, 342 Vietnamese Websites were hit by attackers, 224 of them from outside the country. And over 33.6 million computers were infected with viruses.

BKIS, meanwhile, says financial brokerage sites remain vulnerable as well. “In March 2007, we warned of errors in 12 out of 22 stock brokerage Websites which could be used by hackers to take control of or manipulate data and transactions. In late 2007, we still found errors in 40 percent of a total of 60 securities Websites,” said Nguyen Tu Quang, BKIS director.

— Kelly Jackson Higgins, Senior Editor, Dark Reading