Vietnam remains among the countries most vulnerable to internet attacks, with 40 percent of websites containing security loopholes, according to the country's top internet security firm, BKAV.

The research, carried out from October 2013 to February 2014 by BKAV's WebScan machines, checked website security in more than 25 countries.

According to BKAV, while 40 percent of websites in Vietnam have security loopholes, the figure in Asian countries is 36 percent, European countries are15 percent, while American and African countries are at 5 percent and 33 percent, respectively.

Of note, the firm named several types of popular security loopholes, including XXS, SQL, Injection, and Directory Listings.

"This is the main cause of leaking information from personal credit cards, as well as corporate internal data, " said Ngo Tuan Anh, the deputy director of the firm's Internet security division.

Tuan Anh said even top international financial organisations, such as Visa, Nasdaq and Dow Jones, had been the victims of attacks.

Tuan urged government agencies and computer users to strengthen internet and website security to reduce potential risks.

"It is necessary to set aside from 5 percent to 10 percent of budgets for internet security in each IT project " Tuan added.

Meanwhile, according to the Vietnam Computer Emergency Response Team, 64 percent of agencies were unable to estimate financial losses resulting from attacks, he said.

In addition, 78 out of 100 websites with the government domain "gov.vn" had been reported to have "seriously" poor security systems.

Also, BKAV warned last month, spyware, malware and DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks will continue to pose major risks in 2014.

In 2013, hackers took advantage of security loopholes in Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint and inserted spyware to monitor users' activities on computers.-VNA