BEIJING, June 1 -- Chinese banks are converting their online domain addresses into short and easy-to-remember ones as they seek to improve their online security level and to fight against fraudulent Websites.

    The multi-character domain names of the banks inevitably cause users to easily type wrong addresses which then lead them to fake Websites that often look similar to the banks' Webpages in design.

    Bank of China, which raised US$9.7 billion in a recent initial public offering in Hong Kong, said it will adopt a new 6-character domain address "boc.cn" from today, instead of using its former 17-character "bank-of-china.com."

    "The previous domain address will stop being used in the near future after it co-exists with the new address for a short period" so that users will get familiar with the new one, BOC said in a statement.

    The previous address included too many characters. Criminals have created a fake Website, "bank-off-china.com," with the same look as BOC's official Website to trick users to type their account names and passwords.

    Users of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and Agricultural Bank of China Websites have also been victims of online fraud, according to the National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center.

    So far, 14 out of 20 Chinese banks, including ICBC, ABC and China Construction Bank, have adopted new "cn" domain names, which have fewer characters and are easy to remember.

    Standard Chartered Bank also launched its Chinese short domain address, "zhada.cn," based on its pinyin name.