By ONE Liners Agency,
August 10, 2011
HONG KONG NEWS - Hong Kong stock exchange website experienced "malicious hacking" on Wednesday forcing disruption of trading. The board of directors of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing halted trading at 1:30 p.m. (local time) releasing a press note of the halt due to "technical problems."
The hacking deprived investors from receiving important price-sensitive announcements from at least seven companies.
Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing (HKEx) is the second-high profile exchange this year to admit about the attack. Earlier, Nasdaq OMX was hacked. However, both the exchanges stressed that the trading systems had not been affected.
HKEx chief executive Charles Li said, "Our current assessment is that this is the result of a malicious attack by outside hacking." He added the whereabout of the hackers are not known and even what they had hoped of gaining from this attack.
In the morning the website of seven local-listed companies went off-line, leaving investors in the dark about the new price sensitive announcements. As a result, the exchange suspended trading on these companies. These companies, including Cathay Pacific airline and China Power International were due to make announcements during the lunch break.
The exchange's most liquid stock HSBC, also listed in London, was also halted of trading.
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August 10, 2011 | 1
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