Bangladesh Defence

A group of alleged Bangladeshi hackers named 'Black Hat Hackers' and their counterparts such as Anonymous and others from a number of countries including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Malaysia and United Arab Emirates have already taken more than 25,000 websites in India, which includes some of the important sites such as the website of the Border Security Forces [BSF] etc. It is also learnt that Indian hackers have already hacked into five websites of various ministries in Bangladesh and are now making frantic bid in hacking into the sites of Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited [BTCL] as well as some other key websites. According to the alleged Bangladeshi hacker announcement on various social networking sites, the cyber war is continuing in protest of severe brutality and murder of Border Security Forces [BSF] on India on Bangladeshi civilians for decades. Chief of categorically ruled out the possibility of stopping such notoriety though Indian Home Minister as well as the Prime Minister made number of false promises assuring Bangladeshi government of stopping any form of acts by BSF which goes against basic norms of human rights as well as responsibility towards any neighboring country. Bangladeshi government did not confront such statement of the BSF chief.
Meanwhile another group of Bangladeshi hackers named Bangladesh Cyber Army has also issued a video statement calling upon the Indian government to stating:

1. Stop hacking Bangladeshi websites and stop all types of access to Bangladeshi Cyber space completely,

2. Stop killing innocent Bangladeshi citizens at BD-India borders,

3. Stop Tipaimukh Dam,

4. Sign the Teesta water sharing treaty,

5. Either stop broadcasting of Indian Media [Indian television channels] in Bangladesh or let Bangladeshi media enter India [it may be mentioned here that, Indian authorities and cable operators are maintaining ban on allowing any Bangladeshi TV channel within cable network in India while Indian channels are freely accessed in Bangladesh and each month they are cashing millions of dollars as license fee from Bangladeshi viewers],

6. Stop all anti-Bangladesh activities of BSF and punish all offenders for their deeds against Bangladesh,

7. Last but not the least, India has to stop all activities which go against Bangladesh in any possible way.

The Bangladesh Cyber Army also said, "If these points are not accepted, our next attacks will be much bigger. You might think we are done. But this is just the beginning. Our next target will be Indian Financial System, Communication System, IT Sector and Stock Exchange, and we promise these sites will be destroyed."
The group said, "We don't have any alliance with any political entity or organization. We do not discriminate among anyone regardless of caste, creed and religion. We are not terrorists; we are protecting our cyber space. We hate suppression and oppression and no matter how many fall down in the battle, Bangladeshi hackers cannot be defeated. We can and we will rise from the ashes each time we fall."
Meanwhile, one of the leading vernacular dailies in Bangladesh, The daily Prothom Alo prominently published the news of cyber war and victory of Bangladeshi hackers against India, quoting an Indian newspaper named The Deccan Herald. In the readers comment of this news item, all the readers are making supportive and favorable comments towards Bangladesh hackers, which surely exhibit the public sentiment prevailing in Bangladesh about India.
It is also learnt that Indian government has secretly requested Bangladeshi side to "take stern measures in stopping hacking of Indian sites" by the Bangladeshi hackers. On receiving this request from New Delhi, the ministry of foreign affairs and particularly foreign minister Dr. Dipu Moni already spoke to officials at Ministry of Telecommunication as well as Ministry of Home Affairs, to strategies the "best and quickest possible method" in "combating the Bangladesh hackers. It is even learnt that, Dr. Dipu Moni termed the cyber attack against Indian as "an act by some anti liberation forces and Islamic terror outfits."
Commenting on the current Cyber War between Bangladesh and India, where thousands of Indian financial and business establishments are virtually under vulnerable threat, a cyber specialist said, it won't be very easy for Bangladeshi government to stop such war simply by taking some action against people, who might be doing this from Bangladeshi territory as incase of any such actions, the international collaborators of the Bangladeshi cyber hackers may even intensify their offensives on Indian sites.
Though it was already reported in the media that hackers from Pakistan, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia and United Arab Emirates are cooperating with the Bangladeshi hackers, it is also learnt that, several hacker groups from China, Sri Lanka, CIS countries and few nations in the West have also joined hands with the Bangladeshi side. It is even assumed that hackers from some of the African countries may also join the Bangladeshi side in days. Bangladesh hackers are even trying to hack into Indian aviation and naval sites, which may cause severe damage to the country, if the hackers are successful in hacking into any of them even for some minutes. In similar way, account in Indian banks may be totally garbled by the hackers causing serious problem to Indian financial institutions.

Several postings in the social media including Facebook and LinkedIn have reported an ongoing cyber war between some hackers based in India and Bangladesh. The postings also confirm that the hackers from both the countries have mostly targeted government websites. The incidence of hacking has increased mainly due to some recent developments, including brutal killings by the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) at the Bangladesh-India border and India going ahead with the Tipaimukh dam construction against public opinion in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh Black Hat Hackers, Expire Cyber Army and Bangladesh Cyber Army have locked horns with Indian Cyber Army and Indishel. In last two days, groups from both the countries hacked hundreds of government websites of their rival countries, the social media reported.
In Facebook, the pages of those groups have also mentioned the names of the sites they have had hacked. So far, the Indian groups have accused that the Bangladeshi hackers have hacked over 6,000 of Indian websites while Bangladeshi hackers say the number of sites hacked by the Indian hackers is over 3,000.
Experts meanwhile said that faulty designs and fragile security made government websites an easy prey for hackers, experts say.
Several government websites have repeatedly been hacked in the last one year by local and foreign hackers. Though the sites were restored after a short while, experts fear they may be destroyed again if web security is not strengthened.
The Independent talked to a number of web designers and programmers and they said government sites were being hacked because of their poor design and maintenance.
Julfiqar Ali Bhuiyan, an award winning freelance web designer, told The Independent that the hackers chose government websites as their security features were not as strong as those of commercial websites.
“While designing a site for e-commerce, web security is given the topmost priority as there are economic transactions involved. But government websites are mostly designed to disseminate information, so the security aspect is mostly ignored,” he said.
Bhuiyan said the main problem with the country’s government website was that all of them were under one server. “So if the firewall of one of websites is breached, the rest get vulnerable too,” he said.
The government sites can be made safe through VPS hosting, which inherently provides greater security as it’s separated from other sites, he said.
“Also you can have customised firewalls and install other security measures that most of the hosts won’t allow on shared accounts. Basically, a VPS allows you to take a more active role in your website’s security,” he said.
Another programmer, however, said government sites don’t need costly VPS hosting to beef up their security. Just by downloading the newest versions and updates of Windows, WordPress and antivirus platform, the applications or website could be made hard to crack, he said.
The programmer further said that instead of open access scripting language like PHP, designers should go for suPHP. With suPHP, access is limited to the user or to those explicitly granted permission to access it, he opined.
Mahbub Jaman, president of Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) said every government entity had dedicated personnel to maintain and update their websites. Unfortunately, one can find that the sites are neither updated at the front end (user view) nor at the back end (admin), he said.
“By maintaining simple practices such as updating any of the server security patches, changing the password at the admin panel on a regular basis and hiding the panel could make the sites stronger,” he said.

Bangladesh is eyeing possible purchase of 10 Russian-made Yak-130 lead-in fighter trainer aircraft, a news report said on Wednesday.

Russia's official news agency Itar-Tass in a Singapore-datelined report said on Wednesday that talks were at the initial stage.

"Bangladesh has a big budget, more to it, a state loan might be used," president of Russia's aircraft building corporation Irkut Alexei Fyoforov was quoted as saying by the agency.

Fyoforov reportedly said the market capacity for Yak-130 aircraft might reach 2,500 planes till the year 2020.

"We hope to grip from 25 to 30 percent of this market," he was quoted as saying.

The Yakovlev Yak-130 (NATO reporting name: Mitten) is a subsonic two-seat advanced jet trainer/light attack aircraft or lead-in fighter trainer (LIFT) developed by the Yakovlev Design Bureau.

Development of the plane began in 1991, and the maiden flight was conducted on April 26, 1996, the report said.

In 2005, it won a Russian government tender for training aircraft, and in 2009 the first planes were put into service in the Russian Air Force.







As an advanced training aircraft, the Yak-130 is able to replicate the characteristics of several 4+ generation fighters as well as the fifth-generation Sukhoi T-50, it said.

It can also perform light-attack and reconnaissance duties, carrying a combat load of 3,000 kilogrammes.

The report could not be independently confirmed.