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for. 1.
Invitation for EOI for operation of cross boundary
passenger ferry services 2.
Lawmakers oppose Lok Ma Chau upgrade plan 3.
Firewall may cause live feed problem 4.
Social engineers make a success out of preying on the
weakest link - people 5.
Balance the needs of country residents and visitors
1. Invitation for EOI for operation of cross boundary passenger ferry services
Hong Kong Government,
26 November 2002 The
Government announced today (November 26) the invitation for expressions of interest
and preliminary proposals to occupy and use the existing domestic ferry pier at
Tuen Mun for the operation of cross boundary passenger ferry services to Macau
and cities in the Mainland. A
spokesman for the Government said: "we had received proposals from the private
sector to convert the Tuen Mun Pier to a cross-boundary passenger ferry terminal
("CBFT") and operate ferry services to Macau and other cities in the
Pearl River Delta Region." "A
review of the throughput figures and utilisation rates of the existing CBFTs shows
that there is no immediate need for a new CBFT in Hong Kong. We recognise that
the proposed CBFT could strengthen cross boundary ferry services and enhance the
convenience for residents in the New Territories. However, we have to be prudent
in spending resources in view of the current financial situation." "The
Government is prepared to pursue the project on the basis of a partnership between
the Government and the private sector if there are sufficient private sector interests
in a scheme with the following major elements :- (a)
the Government to provide necessary services such as immigration, customs, police,
marine control and port health etc. to support the operation of the proposed CBFT;
(b)
the operator(s) to be required to : (i)
be responsible for the necessary works for pier conversion/modification (estimated
to be about $26 million); (ii)
pay for the non-recurrent items such as systems, equipment and furniture required
for Government Department's operation (estimated to be about $33 million); (iii)
pay an annual fee of not less than $15 million to the Government; (iv)
pay the electricity cost for the operation of Government Departments at the proposed
CBFT (estimated to be about $2.5 million per year); and (v)
be responsible for the maintenance and general management of the proposed CBFT
(estimated to be about $8 million per year); and (c)
subject to availability of space and Government prior approval, the operator may
be allowed to sub-let terminal premises designated by Government, berthing slots,
advertising and shopping space (if any) and baggage handling services (if any)
and to keep fees for such subletting. Revenue arising from duty-free shops, if
any, will be shared between the operator and Government. "If
there is positive response to the invitation for expressions of interest exercise
and everything goes smoothly, we intend to conduct an open tender exercise in
the first half of 2003 to select the operator(s)." The
spokesman added that; "we will consider granting the selected operator(s)
the right to operate cross boundary passenger ferry services from the proposed
CBFT for a period of five years, which may be renewed in due course". The
Project Outline can be obtained from:- (a)
Environment, Transport and Works Bureau, Reception Counter, 15/F, Murray Building,
3 Garden Road, Central, Hong Kong; (b)
Marine Department Headquarters Counter, Room 2121, 21/F, Harbour Building, 38
Pier Road, Central, Hong Kong; and (c)
Government Property Agency, Reception Counter, 31/F, Revenue Tower, 5 Gloucester
Road, Wan Chai, Hong Kong; or the Internet at the following addresses:- http://www.etwb.gov.hk/
http://www.info.gov.hk/mardep/index.htm
Interested
parties are invited to submit 10 copies of their submission to Marine Department
at Room 2121, 21/F, Harbour Building, 38 Pier Road, Hong Kong on or before 5 pm,
December 30, 2002. Late submission will not be accepted. At
present there are two CBFTs in Hong Kong, namely the Macau Ferry Terminal and
the China Ferry Terminal. In 2001, their combined passenger throughput was 17.9
million, representing an average utilisation rate of 68 per cent. The
Tuen Mun Pier has four berths, one of which is currently used for the operation
of a domestic passenger ferry service to and from Chek Lap Kok. The other three
berths could be made available for operation of cross boundary passenger ferry
services after pier modification works are necessary to accommodate the boundary
control facilities.
2. Lawmakers oppose Lok Ma Chau upgrade plan
Staff
reporter, The Standard 28 November 2002 Lawmakers
yesterday opposed the government's HK$656 million plan for infrastructure to facilitate
the Lok Ma Chau spur-line terminal building, saying the project appeared to cater
only to the interests of the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation (KCRC). The
criticisms came as the government sought support for project funding at the Legislative
Council's transport panel meeting yesterday. The
project includes building cross-border clearance and control facilities at the
Lok Ma Chau terminus, a passenger bridge linking the terminus and the Huanggang
Station, a double-deck link bridge to connect the passenger bridge to the terminus,
and widening an existing access road to a two-lane carriageway with a footpath. Construction
is expected to begin next February and be completed by 2007. The project would
create 246 jobs, comprising 54 professional and technical staff and 192 labourers. The
cross-boundary facilities would cater for a daily two-way passenger flow of 150,000. However,
legislators from the Democratic Party, including Andrew Cheng, Albert Chan and
Wong Shing-chi objected to the proposal. They said the KCRC provided access to
the Lok Ma Chau station and the project seemed to be built for the railway. Principal
Assistant Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works William Siu denied
the project catered only to the KCRC.
3. Firewall may cause live feed problem
DANYLL
WILLS, SCMP 27 November 2002 We
are a European company with a Hong Kong office, where we have a PCCW broadband
Internet account that we share over a wireless LAN. It services four personal
computers. The system works fine, except for one problem: no PC on our network
is able to send files or voice chat over broadband to any remote location. We
can chat in writing and we can send video packets online but we cannot send voice
messages or transfer files directly. However, this all works with a dial-up connection.
Neither
PCCW nor Microsoft could solve the problem. We
need to use broadband over wireless LAN and communicate video and voice over MSN
and transfer files to our Geneva head office. Do you have any hints? Name
and address supplied If
dial-up works but broadband does not, it sounds like a firewall problem. One solution
you may want to have a look at is Trillian Pro version 1.0, from Cerulean Studios
(ceruleanstudios.com). Cerulean
has an instant messaging client for corporations that it claims can handle video
and firewalls. The free version only handles text messaging, but the professional
version, which costs US$25, adds numerous features including video conferencing.
At that price, you may be getting a great bargain. If
you are looking for a more dedicated conferencing system, you could check out
Polycom (www.polycom.com). The price is significantly
more than US$25, but it is more professional. Further
to the topic of bar codes, Tech Talk was contacted by the Hong Kong Article Numbering
Association (HKANA). Here is an edited version of their response from marketing
communications and training manager Joyce Chau (tel: 2863 9762; fax: 2861 2423;
e-mail: joycechau@hkana.org). In
2001-02, HKANA launched the Global e-ID Campaign, sponsored by the Innovation
and Technology Fund. This year-long campaign aimed to promote the use of article
numbers (e-ID) in business operations among small- and medium-sized enterprises
(SMEs). One of the core deliverables of this campaign was the SME Ambassador Programme,
in which HKANA selected five SME ambassadors and assisted them in implementing
a bar-code system. Sponsored
by the SME Development Fund, the SME Ambassador Programme will be launched again
soon. We welcome all those interested to contact us. Questions
to Tech Talk will not be answered personally. We reserve the right to edit letters.
E-mail techtalk@scmp.com
4. Social engineers make a success out of preying on the weakest link - people
DAVID WILSON,
SCMP 27 November 2002 In
case the world does not already feel menacing enough, this week we examine a phenomenon
called social engineering. The
term conjures up images of Aldous Huxley's dystopian World State, where everyone
consumes soma to fight depression and babies are born in laboratories. But in
the digital dictionary, it means something even more sinister: breaking an organisation's
security by interaction with the weakest link - people. Rather
than looking for weaknesses in software, some crackers (malevolent hackers) try
to find them in wetware: that concentration of nerve tissue called the human brain.
Put
another way, they exploit our stupidity. A
prime example of social engineering is the virus which comes in an e-mail displaying
an alluring subject line. Rarely
will a virus come clean and say: "Watch out! I'm the world's worst worm -
delete me before I delete your hard drive." Quite
the reverse. To echo Hamlet and Goodfellas, a virus will come as your friend and
smile and smile. Just
look at some of the 45 subject lines used by one of the nastiest viruses now prowling
the Web, Bugbear. The lines runs the gamut from the enticing "Get a FREE
gift!" to the beseeching "Please Help . . ." and the devilishly
familiar "Reminder". If
you are wise to the come-ons, do not get smug because social engineering takes
less obvious forms. One scheme commonly found on America Online is to send an
e-mail which says there is a problem with your account: "Would you please
send your username and password by return e-mail so it can be fixed?" At
least with an e-mail, the target has time to think before making the choice between
deleting and downloading. But
these sociopaths may also attack by telephone, using all sorts of dirty tricks.
A freely available online hacker advises: "Try to make the person you're
imitating a female [unless you are a female]. Most of the guys running these things
will give anything to a good sounding woman because the majority of the guys running
mini-computers are social messes. Act like a woman [using a voice changer] and
you'll have anything you want from them." If
the social mess targeted fails to respond favourably to the once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity of dialogue with an apparent possessor of the XX chromosome, the hacker
may then turn on the charm applying NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) persuasion
techniques. NLP hinges on building rapport, the state where you feel strongly
connected to another person, begin to like the person and feel you might even
want to get intimate. Rapport
is achieved by pacing and leading techniques that involve matching verbal (what
you say) and non-verbal (how you say it) aspects. Then, as the prospect starts
to warm up, the hacker may mirror the person's behaviour, tone, tempo and volume.
It
works because it preys on the natural human inclination to be kind and helpful,
which managers blithely encourage their staff to develop. Some
employees, especially temps, will tell you everything from the safe combination
to the name of the boss' secret squeeze, if asked nicely. A
man who could charm a water-cooler into dispensing wine is Kevin Mitnick, the
New York celebrity hacker who, before his imprisonment in 1999, was notoriously
adept at getting secrets out of suckers. "You
try to make an emotional connection with the person on the other side to create
a sense of trust," he says. The
trust can be strengthened through what he calls "improvisation" - learning
a company's internal lingo and tidbits of information that normally only an insider
will know. So
how do you avoid deception by fiends in Mr Mitnick's mould? One
approach is to treat every new contact as a potential rattlesnake and ignore their
e-mail or put them on hold. This, however, is perhaps not the best way to cultivate
new business relationships. Another deterrent is the "monitoring this call
for quality assurance" electronic spiel which must prompt many a would-be
con artist to hang up and shut up. But
sometimes hackers use a brutally invasive technique known as "shoulder surfing"
(looking over your shoulder while you type in your password). To
avert this threat, spread your shoulders the way you might if viewing adult content.
Or employ the tried-and-tested, non-verbal technique of an elbow to the solar
plexus. Confused
by computer jargon? E-mail technopedia@scmp.com
with your questions.
5. Balance the needs of country residents and visitors
Tim
Hamlett, SCMP 28 November 2002 Hong
Kong countryside will have felt an instinctive sympathy with the group complaining
that the government is desecrating one of the few mementoes of paradise by running
a water pipeline through the Sai Kung Country Park to Tai Long Wan. No
doubt the appearance of the project is highly disruptive. I enjoy a walk in the
country as much as anyone and recall being rather peeved once when a concrete
path appeared in the middle of my usual route. On
the other hand, some rather dubious assertions have been made in the course of
this campaign. The
purpose of the new water main is to carry a proper water supply to several villages.
There is some dispute over the number of inhabitants, but the general consensus
seems to be about 50 people. These
people are perfectly entitled to live in Tai Long Wan. Mains water is also a proper
ambition, generally speaking. So what are we being asked to support here? This
looks dangerously like an attempt to force some people to live in primitive squalor
so others may enjoy an unsullied country stroll at weekends. I
am not impressed by the argument that, at $30 million, the project is unreasonably
expensive for the number of people it will benefit. Mains
water is now regarded as an amenity to be provided more or less universally, but
some consumers are easier to supply than others. One
of the less cheerful facets of going for a country walk in Hong Kong is the number
of abandoned villages. Some of them have been empty for decades. The houses have
been levelled by erosion and only the occasional stretch of terracing under the
trees tells you this once was a place where people lived and farmed, while others
are of comparatively recent vintage. We
have a fine collection of abandoned villages as people are no longer prepared
to live in rural isolation. They want proper supplies of water and power, regular
visits from the police and postman, and access to public transport. The
trouble, alas, is that once these things are provided the village suffers a different
sort of death. Residents get jobs in urban areas and with the resulting wealth
they replace their traditional houses with modern, three-storey structures and
rent out the upper floors to outsiders. What was once afarming outpost then becomes
a dormitory suburb. If
there is access to a main road, fields give rise to strange new crops - piles
of scrap cars, concrete parks full of construction machinery, piles of empty shipping
containers and other eyesores. There
is always a potential conflict of interest between those who live and work in
the country and those who wish to visit it for pleasure. Villagers
feel they are entitled to enrich themselves - that is capitalism. Visitors
feel that greed is destroying the very things that make the country worth visiting.
No
doubt there is some justice in both positions. What we need is a government which
balances the requirements of the two groups, so rural areas remain rural while
allowing scope for the reasonable aspirations of their permanent inhabitants.
While
waiting for this, though, we cannot in all fairness have some areas awash with
small houses and light industry while others are kept as compulsory deserts for
the amusement of local tree-huggers. The
Tai Long Wan water pipe will probably look all right once it is finished and covered
with weeds. I would not have any objection to the villagers being supplied with
a power line as well. But
what should not be allowed - under any circumstances - is a road. Tim
Hamlett (hamlett@hkbu.edu.hk) is an associate
professor in the Department of Journalism at the Baptist University. | 
