Copyright 2004 Jang New Service 23 December, 2004 SECTION: Business News, Page 12 HEADLINE: Body formed for IT security BYLINE: Muhammad Zubair Uddin URL: KARACHI: Cybernet has established Pak Con, a non-profit organisation to bring into limelight issues related with information security and create awareness among the IT community as well as the masses. Country General Manager, Cyber Internet Services, Javed Wadood announced the formation of Pak Con at the opening session of Pakistans first Cyber Security Convention held here on Wednesday. "We are well aware of the fact that there is a high probability to the level of certainty that technology can be converted from a tool of progression into a tool for repression," he said. Therefore, to curb all the threats of such nature it was necessary to develop a sound and effective information security defence system that would daunt all hazardous actions, he said. He further said that Pak Con has also been formed with a mission to bring Pakistan on a par with any developed nation of the world focusing on research and application of computer security components. The convention geared towards hackers, programmers, phreaks, administrators, engineers and open source advocates in discovering what was going on in the information security. He invited the involvement of business, legal and allied sectors to participate in formulating cyber laws and trade policies to make Pakistan synonymous with advanced research in the IT world. Meanwhile Emmanuel Gadaix of Telecom Security Task Force, in his presentation focused on advanced techniques of phreaking another name of hacking, which remains illegal, for the 21st century cyber warrior and explained how it can be compromised for fun and profit. Senior Security Consultant, Cyber, Faiz Ahmed Shuja highlighted the vested interests of the hacker including satisfaction of personal ego, money, entertainment as well as political or economical enforcement. Jawad A Sarwana said that Pakistan has entered into the realm of electronic commerce regulation with the promulgation of the Electronic Transactions Ordinance 2002. The Ordinance provides legal recognition to cyber contracts, records, and transactions in electronic form. However, there is no provision of law as yet which would cover cyber crimes, he added. LANGUAGE: English