Singapore’s web cut-off for public workers balances cyber security and inconvenience

Some security experts say the policy, due to be in place by May, risks damaging productivity among civil servants and those working at more than four dozen statutory boards, and cutting them off from the people they serve. It may only raise slightly the defensive walls against cyber attack, they say.

Ben Desjardins, director of security solutions at network security firm Radware, called it “one of the more extreme measures I can recall by a large public organisation to combat cyber security risks”. Stephen Dane, a Hong Kong-based managing director at networking company Cisco Systems, said it was “a most unusual situation”, and Ramki Thurimella, chair of the computer science department at the University of Denver, called it both “unprecedented” and “a little excessive”.

But not everyone takes that view. Other cyber security experts agree with Singapore authorities that with the kind of threats governments face today it has little choice but to restrict internet access.

FireEye, a cyber security company, found that organisations in Southeast Asia were 80 per cent more likely than the global average to be hit by an advanced cyber attack, with those close to tensions over the South China Sea – where China and others have overlapping claims – were particularly targeted.

Bryce Boland, FireEye’s chief technology officer for Asia Pacific, said Singapore’s approach needed to be seen in this light. “My view is not that they’re blocking internet access for government employees, it’s that they are blocking government computer access from Internet-based cyber crime and espionage.”