The National Police Agency’s Cyber Bureau and National Cyber Countermeasures Office, which were established on April 1 of last year to deal with increasingly serious cyber crimes, are promoting international cooperation and are beginning to produce results.
The two organizations collaborate with overseas investigative agencies, and in some cases information provided by them has led to the indictment of suspects. It has also been effective in tracking criminal proceeds from crypto assets, something that police have had difficulty dealing with in the past. A National Police Agency official said, “We want to see results one by one.”
In May, the U.S. Department of Justice charged police with using ransomware, a computer virus that encrypts data and prevents its owners from accessing it unless they pay a ransom, in a cyber attack on police and other authorities in Washington. A Russian man was indicted.