GMO asks government to take active cyber defense measures

GMO Internet has made an urgent request for the Japanese government to implement “active cyber defense” operations following an unauthorized access incident, sources said Saturday.

GMO Internet has revealed that there was unauthorized access to its servers for automated FX currency margin trading. A total of 26,739 such servers may have been affected.

Since some users have reported losses from unauthorized transactions on their accounts following the incident, the company said Saturday that it will compensate users for these losses.

The company also plans to make a consolation payment of ¥5,000 to all users, regardless of whether they have suffered financial damage.

On Oct. 1, the government began operations under the active cyber defense system, which involves the Self-Defense Forces and police pre-emptively breaking into an attacker’s server to neutralize it and prevent damage.