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JAPAN
Mar 11, 2019

Municipalities launch multilingual services for crises

The eighth anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11 is a good opportunity to learn disaster preparedness measures. Understanding how to obtain emergency information from reliable sources, such as local governments, is a good first step.
EDITORIALS
Jun 1, 2017

Amended privacy protection law

Efforts must be made to ensure that tightened rules on the handling of personal data does not deter the disclosure or flow of necessary information in the name of privacy protection.
JAPAN
Jun 4, 2002

Private data kept by all SDF arms

The Defense Agency on Monday said that it and each branch of the Self-Defense Forces have systematically collected data on individuals who made information-disclosure requests, contradicting a statement last week indicating the practice was isolated to the Maritime Self-Defense Force and carried out...
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 19, 2021

Looking back on Japan’s secrets protection law

The operative assumption from critics of the secrets legislation was that the new law would restrict freedom of information and make the Japanese government increasingly opaque.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 13, 2019

Japan needs guidelines and infrastructure for multilingual support for foreign residents

It is high time that the national government formulated guidelines on what information it should disseminate in what languages.
EDITORIALS
Feb 9, 2019

Tighten rules on data privacy

The entire process should be placed under some form of third-party oversight and no longer left entirely to the discretion of investigation authorities.
EDITORIALS
Aug 27, 2016

'Big data' and privacy protection

The government has some hard choices to make when it comes to implementing changes in the law on privacy protection.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Sep 3, 2015

57 more Clinton email threads contain foreign government info

"Here's my personal email," Hillary Rodham Clinton wrote to U.S. special envoy George Mitchell on a summer Sunday in 2010 as he telephoned one European official after another in an effort to keep peace talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians on track.
EDITORIALS
Mar 31, 2015

Trading personal data

A proposed revision to the law on protecting personal information, already submitted to the Diet, would allow businesses that hold customer data to provide the information to third parties as long as the data is processed to prevent identification of the individuals. It is intended to facilitate the...
EDITORIALS
Dec 11, 2014

Worries about secrets law linger

As Japan's state secrets law finally takes effect a year after it was enacted, much of the concern that many people had about the legislation remains unaddressed.
EDITORIALS
Nov 2, 2008

Handling info in the MSDF

The Yokohama District Court on Oct. 28 gave a suspended 2 1/2-year prison term to a lieutenant commander of the Maritime Self-Defense Force for passing information on the U.S.-developed Aegis weapons system to another lieutenant commander, an instructor at an MSDF school in Etajima, Hiroshima Prefecture....
EDITORIALS
Feb 22, 2007

'Secrets' with a public interest

The Self-Defense Forces' investigation of an SDF member in connection with a news report of an accident in a Chinese Navy submarine in 2005 raises concerns regarding people's right to know and the freedom of the press. It could lead to limits on basic rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution....
EDITORIALS
Aug 5, 2005

Safeguards for a DNA database

The National Police Agency has been implementing a phased plan to construct a database of DNA patterns of suspects and convicted criminals to facilitate criminal investigations. DNA patterns, also called DNA fingerprints, can identify individuals almost as accurately as real fingerprints. A 2002 Interpol...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 5, 2003

Weathernews finds silver lining in abnormal global patterns

Many countries witnessed abnormal weather this past summer, from devastating heat waves in Europe to economy-chilling cold weather in Japan.
Members of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces take part in a military review at Camp Asaka in October 2018. The nation’s public is currently favorable to the SDF, but if scandals aren’t handled correctly, that opinion may change. 
EDITORIALS
Jul 12, 2024

A multitude of scandals threaten Japan’s national defense

Individually, recent scandals are troubling. Together they are reflective of a problematic culture within the defense forces and bureaucracy.
Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa speaks at a news conference on Friday over sexual assault incidents involving U.S. service members.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 14, 2024

Japan lawmakers criticize U.S. for failing to report military assault cases

Meanwhile, the Japanese government has not protested the failure or demanded improvements, saying there was no problem with the U.S. side.
Maritime Self-Defense Chief of Staff Adm. Ryo Sakai (center) following a news conference in Tokyo on July 12
JAPAN
Jul 19, 2024

Poor understanding of the law behind mishandling of secrets in MSDF

The scandal has prompted the Defense Ministry to dole out mass punishments and led to the resignation of a top officer.
Former economic security minister Takayuki Kobayashi says changes in the international balance of power, along with deepening economic interdependence, have led some countries to attempt to use their economic power to impose their will on others.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 13, 2024

Economic security is about strengthening and sustaining growth, former minister says

The nascent concept goes beyond more regulations and restrictions, says Japan's first economic security minister, Takayuki Kobayashi.
The Foreign Ministry in Tokyo
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 30, 2024

Japan's Foreign Ministry seeks ¥66.2 billion to fight false info

The total amount of funds sought in the budget request for fiscal 2025 is ¥814.6 billion, up 12.3% from the initial budget for the previous year.
Pedestrians walk past the Financial Services Agency headquarters in Tokyo.
JAPAN
Aug 31, 2024

Over 2.5 million sets of info leaked from four Japan nonlife insurers

Of the total, employees on loan were found to have been involved in about 240,000 cases, including for contracts for corporate customers.
The Financial Services Agency in Tokyo. The financial instruments and exchange law prohibits corporate officials privy to important information, such as tender offers, from trading related shares before the information is made public.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 19, 2024

Judge seconded to FSA probed over insider trading suspicions

Since summer, the SESC has been investigating individuals and places related to the judge and scrutinizing his transaction details.
Rescuers work at a site of a residential building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, in October 2022.
WORLD
Dec 24, 2024

How one man became a Ukrainian traitor and Russian spy

Before the full-scale invasion, Ukrainian nationals were mainly recruited during trips to Russia, but approaches are more often made online now using social networks.
Christians take selfies after a Christmas Eve Mass at the Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Banda Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia, on Tuesday, ahead of the 20th anniversary of a magnitude 9.1 earthquake that struck the coast of Sumatra on Dec. 26, 2004, triggering a huge tsunami across the Indian Ocean.
BUSINESS / Tech
Dec 25, 2024

Blogs to Bluesky: Social media shifts responses after 2004 tsunami

In two decades, the online social media landscape has experienced a vast change, allowing information — as well as rumor and misinformation — to flow in real time.
A disinformation graphic spread via Telegram before a Russian offensive in Ukraine's Kharkiv region. The Kremlin has deployed its sophisticated propaganda machinery to justify its offensive in Ukraine, and China is learning from Russian influence tactics.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 25, 2024

China is taking a page from Russia’s disinformation playbook

Russian and Chinese influence operations are increasingly similar and complementary, showing how the two regimes are collaborating to dominate the information space.
Palestinians gather to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on Dec. 4.
WORLD
Dec 31, 2024

As Gaza suffers, experts call on hunger monitor to redefine famine

Many food-security experts, aid workers and doctors say famine took hold in Gaza many months ago.
South Korea, along with countries such as France and Italy, have asked questions about DeepSeek's data practices, submitting a written request for information about how the company handles user information.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Feb 6, 2025

South Korean ministries and police block access to DeepSeek

The move comes after the Chinese artificial intelligence startup did not respond to a request about how it manages user information.
The Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi (center) attends a Cabinet meeting in Tokyo on Friday.
JAPAN / Politics
Feb 7, 2025

Japan's Cabinet approves legislation on 'active' cybersecurity

The new measures aim to enable the government to infiltrate the sources of cyberattacks in order to neutralize them.
Japan's cyberdefense legislation is designed for the government to acquire and analyze communication information in normal times.
JAPAN
Mar 18, 2025

Japan's active cyberdefense bills include normal-time monitoring

The bills also call for establishing an independent organization to supervise cyberdefense operations and file relevant reports to parliament.
Max Lesser, a senior analyst on emerging threats at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, has uncovered a network of companies operated by a secretive Chinese tech firm that has been trying to recruit recently laid-off U.S. government workers.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 26, 2025

Secretive Chinese network tries to lure fired federal workers in U.S.

Max Lesser, a researcher who uncovered the network, said the campaign follows "well-established" techniques used by previous Chinese intelligence operations.

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.