Network sources report that Japan intends to carry out the development of malware that will be used if the country is attacked. Such reports appeared in the Japanese press, citing knowledgeable government sources.
It is known that the development of the necessary software is planned to be completed by the end of the current financial year. The project will be implemented by a contractor, civil servants will not be involved in it.
Information about the capabilities of the mentioned software, as well as the scenarios in which Japan is ready to use it, is not yet available. It is likely that the government intends to use malware if attacks on government institutions are detected.
This strategy is explained by the fact that in recent years the level of military threat from China has increased in the region. The ability to repel cyber attacks is only one of the components of a full-scale modernization of the Japanese armed forces. Thus, the country actually recognized the development of cyber weapons. Most likely, the government intends to continue strengthening the position of the state in this area in the future.
It is worth noting that in 2019, the Japanese government allowed employees of the National Institute of Information and Communication Technology (NICT) to hack IoT devices in the state. This activity comes as part of an unprecedented survey of insecure IoT devices. Ultimately, it is planned to create a registry of devices that are protected by a weak or standard password, after which the collected information will be transferred to Internet service providers for work aimed at eliminating the problem.