Any major cyberattack damage during the quadrennial event, which attracts attention across the globe, would harm Japan's reputation.

"You can't prepare too much," a government official said, apparently bearing in mind the ransomware attack that swept the world in May this year.

Some pundits blame North Korea for the attack, but there is no concrete proof of who was behind it.

In the 2012 London Games, hackers attacked the power system that supported the opening ceremony. Although there was no major damage, some 200 million cyber attacks happened during the games.

"Cyber attacks are evolving day by day," said Toshio Nawa, a senior analyst at Tokyo-based Cyber Defense Institute Inc.

"Measures used in London do not work in many cases," he warned.

The opening ceremony of the Tokyo Games is slated for July 24, 2020, at the new National Stadium in the Japanese capital. Given an increase in cyber attacks, it would not be too much of a stretch to imagine that such attacks could trigger a blackout during the ceremony.

According to Japan's National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, or NICT, cyberattack-related data transmission happened 128.1 billion times in 2016, jumping 2.4-fold from the previous year.

Britain started preparations for cyberattacks against the 2012 London Games six years before. Many observers say the Japanese government has been too slow.

Impatient with the situation, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's task force on cyber security on May 23 handed a proposal to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that the government promptly establish a command center for cyber attack countermeasures.

But the government only plans to start full-fledged operations of such a center about a month before the Tokyo Games.

"I don't think a hastily created organization can handle emergency situations," a pundit said.

The government also needs to work on nurturing human resources.

The LDP task force's proposal calls on the government to secure at least 10 leaders and 200 highly skilled workers to counter cyberattacks in time for the 2020 Games. But there is a serious shortage of such workers, observers say.

There are only three years left before the Tokyo Games.

A concerned member of the task force said, "It would be too late after a disaster strikes." (Jiji Press)