【明報專訊】Security First Network Bank (SFNB), now defunct, was the world's first network bank. When it went online yesterday in 1995, our cyberspace was far less sophisticated - and less messy - than it is today. Now "Internet" is synonymous (同義的) not only with information exchange at lightning speed but also with myriad forms of cybercrime.

About SFNB

The first pure Internet bank in the United States, SFNB had no physical offices. It could only be accessed online. It was founded in October 1995 by James S Mahan III. "Customers will be able to make deposits, pay bills and reconcile accounts 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Anyone with a computer and a modem is our potential customer," said Mahan.

SFNB's banking operations were sold to the Royal Bank of Canada in 1998.

Online banking and the security concerns

SFNB might not have been a successful experiment. It was nonetheless a trailblazer (拓荒者), as evidenced by the fact that online banking is quite common today. The possibility of transferring money, paying a bill and investing money with a click of the mouse is one of the comforts the information revolution has brought us. But none should be oblivious to security risks of online banking. These include fake internet addresses, phishing (釣魚式攻擊, the attempt to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerade), cross-site scripting (跨網站指令碼) and Trojan Horses (木馬程式). In August, for example, some people received an email allegedly sent by Hang Seng Bank (恒生銀行). The email claimed that the bank was updating its security system, demanding that the receiver click on a hyperlink (超連結) provided so as to "verify" his account. It was later found that the email was a con.

Minimisation of security risks

There are measures that can be taken to reduce the security risks. Many providers of online banking services allow users to adopt two-factor authentication (雙重認證). To log into their account, the user has to enter two passwords, the second of which is generated by a security token. This second password is valid for only a short period of time, making it harder for a hacker to game the system.

There are also other ways to enhance the security of online banking:

˙Use a password that is difficult to guess. A strong password should be at least 8 characters long and contain numbers and letters.

˙Never reveal your passwords to others.

˙Change your passwords regularly.

˙Make sure that the website of the bank you are visiting is real. Do not try to access your bank by clicking on a hyperlink contained in an email.

˙Do not access your bank with a public computer.

˙Have an anti-virus program installed on your personal computer.

Other cybercrimes

There are many other types of cybercrimes, including cyberterrorism, cyber-extortion (網絡勒索)and cyber-warfare (網絡戰爭). Cyberterrorism can in general be defined as an act of terrorism committed through the use of cyberspace or computer resources. An example is a post on an online forum declaring there will be a bomb attack somewhere. Cyber-extortion occurs when a website, e-mail server or computer system is subjected to or threatened with repeated denial of service or other attacks by malicious hackers. As for cyberwarfare, Richard A Clarke, an expert in the field, has defined it as "actions by a nation-state to penetrate (滲透)another nation's computers or networks for the purpose of causing damage or disruption".