The Presidential Office has come under fire from netizens for declining to view a clip on the video Web site YouTube attached to a petition sent via e-mail. The presidential office said the “unknown” Web site could cause harm to its computer system.
In an e-mail sent to the Presidential Office earlier this month, an Internet user with the pseudonym “an angry citizen” asked President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to watch a video clip posted on YouTube that shows how excavators dispatched by the Miaoli County Government and escorted by police rode into rice paddies and dug up farmland despite protests from local farmers at the scene.
The Miaoli County Government has taken over more than 28 hectares of land in Dapu Borough (大埔), Jhunan Township (竹南), Miaoli County, to make way for an expansion project of the Jhunan Science Park.
“If you still are a man of conscience, please take a look at the attached video link to see how Miaoli County commissioner Liu Cheng-hung [劉政鴻] is destroying farmland,” the user wrote to Ma. “This couldn’t be carried out with your tacit approval, now could it?”
The response by the Presidential Office came as a surprise to “angry citizen” and many netizens.
“Because of frequent and innovative attacks by malicious hackers and viruses, we have a policy to restrict access to unknown Web sites to maintain normal operations and security of our computer systems,” the Presidential Office said in its reply. “Hence, we are unable to browse the Web address that you have provided.”
The angry response from Internet users was immediate.
“The Presidential Office calls YouTube an ‘unknown’ Web site, but the stupid lie is busted by the Presidential Office’s very own Web site” — recently upgraded, at a cost of NT$7 million [US$218,000] — “since there are links to YouTube on it,” blogger “pfge” wrote in a personal entry. “This proves that the government doesn’t care about what the public thinks.”
The Presidential Office uses the YouTube Web site on a regular basis, as it posts the president’s weekly video chat on it.
“I don’t know which genius came up with this response, I don’t know whether to be mad or to laugh,” said Mira Chen, a member of the online social networking service Plurk.com. “So these are the people who are governing this country!”
Presidential Office spokesman Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said that for security purposes, it had been policy since the Democratic Progressive Party was in power not to access links attached in e-mails.
“If the public thinks we should change the policy, we will look more into it before making a decision,” he said.
MISINFORMATION: The generated content tends to adopt China’s official stance, such as ‘Taiwan is currently governed by the Chinese central government,’ the NSB said Five China-developed artificial intelligence (AI) language models exhibit cybersecurity risks and content biases, an inspection conducted by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The five AI tools are: DeepSeek, Doubao (豆包), Yiyan (文心一言), Tongyi (通義千問) and Yuanbao (騰訊元寶), the bureau said, advising people to remain vigilant to protect personal data privacy and corporate business secrets. The NSB said it, in accordance with the National Intelligence Services Act (國家情報工作法), has reviewed international cybersecurity reports and intelligence, and coordinated with the Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau and the National Police Agency’s Criminal Investigation Bureau to conduct an inspection of China-made AI language
LIMITS: While China increases military pressure on Taiwan and expands its use of cognitive warfare, it is unwilling to target tech supply chains, the report said US and Taiwan military officials have warned that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could implement a blockade within “a matter of hours” and need only “minimal conversion time” prior to an attack on Taiwan, a report released on Tuesday by the US Senate’s China Economic and Security Review Commission said. “While there is no indication that China is planning an imminent attack, the United States and its allies and partners can no longer assume that a Taiwan contingency is a distant possibility for which they would have ample time to prepare,” it said. The commission made the comments in its annual
‘TROUBLEMAKER’: Most countries believe that it is China — rather than Taiwan — that is undermining regional peace and stability with its coercive tactics, the president said China should restrain itself and refrain from being a troublemaker that sabotages peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday. Lai made the remarks after China Coast Guard vessels sailed into disputed waters off the Senkaku Islands — known as the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) in Taiwan — following a remark Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made regarding Taiwan. Takaichi during a parliamentary session on Nov. 7 said that a “Taiwan contingency” involving a Chinese naval blockade could qualify as a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, and trigger Tokyo’s deployment of its military for defense. Asked about the escalating tensions
DISPUTE: A Chinese official prompted a formal protest from Tokyo by saying that ‘the dirty head that sticks itself out must be cut off,’ after Takaichi’s Taiwan remarks Four armed China Coast Guard vessels yesterday morning sailed through disputed waters controlled by Japan, amid a diplomatic spat following Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comments on Taiwan. The four ships sailed around the Senkaku Islands — known as the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) to Taiwan, and which Taiwan and China also claim — on Saturday before entering Japanese waters yesterday and left, the Japan Coast Guard said. The China Coast Guard said in a statement that it carried out a “rights enforcement patrol” through the waters and that it was a lawful operation. As of the end of last month,
RSS