The government announced Monday it will take a more active role in bolstering cyberspace security, expressing concern about an increase in international cybercrime.

A government panel tasked with examining cybersecurity issues envisages the creation of a policy forum in 2015 that would allow Tokyo to mount a coordinated response to online threats in line with the government's goal of hosting a successful 2020 Olympics.

"Ensuring cybersecurity is an extremely important challenge in terms of national security and crisis management," Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told a meeting of the panel held at his office, which was also attended by Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and other officials. "We will tackle the issue more aggressively," Abe said.

The policy forum would cooperate with other government bodies, including the National Security Council, which makes decisions on foreign and defense policies, the draft said.

Its secretariat, headed by a senior bureaucrat, would have contact with cybersecurity authorities in other countries as well as private sector firms in Japan, and would liaise with them to develop policy.