Japan will set up an interministerial team to prevent cyberterrorism and protect its planned "cybergovernment" from attack, government officials said Wednesday.

The decision was made at a meeting of a security task force of a government panel on information technology strategy, they said.

The team will be set up in fiscal 2002, which begins April 1, so it will be in place for the launch of the cybergovernment in fiscal 2003. The cybergovernment will let people access various public services online, the officials said.

The task force also adopted an action plan with goals and deadlines for each ministry and agency, the officials said.

The plan says, for example, that the Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications, and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, will draw up a list of codes to be used by ministries and agencies in the planned cybergovernment by the end of fiscal 2002.

The task force also decided to set up public-private coordination networks to act swiftly in case of terrorist attacks on the key infrastructure networks, such as those relating to financial and transportation systems, the officials said.

Under the plan, companies in the communications, financial and aviation sectors are to report immediately to the supervising ministry and agency of their industry when they receive threats or damage from terrorists. This information would be concentrated at the Cabinet Secretariat.

Baggage crackdown

All Nippon Airways, Japan Airlines and Japan Air System started stepping up surveillance on checked baggage Wednesday at all domestic airports, airline officials said.

The three airlines will now put all checked domestic baggage through X-ray inspections and label them with identification tags.

These measures are already standard on international flights and a limited number of domestic services, the officials said.

Airports that are not equipped with X-ray machines will check bags manually, according to the officials.

Hijacking measures

The transport ministry said Wednesday it has implemented measures set out in its commercial aviation antiterrorism manual drawn up after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Should an aircraft be hijacked, the ministry will immediately order all airborne planes to land at the nearest airport, an official of the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Ministry said.

It will order all aircraft at airports to be grounded and Japan-bound international flights to return to their point of origin, the official said.

These orders will be issued to avoid airborne collisions with hijacked planes, the official said.