Cyber attack hits Danish govt, defence websites
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Denmark may have been targeted by Russian hackers for its support for Ukraine.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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COPENHAGEN – Danish government and defence websites were hit in a wide-ranging cyber attack on Nov 13, the country’s Civil Protection Agency has said, with pro-Russia hackers claiming responsibility.
The agency is “aware that several Danish companies and websites were currently experiencing outages and operating disruptions because of DDoS attacks”.
Distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks halt access to a website by overloading its servers with traffic.
The agency said it is “following the situation closely”, in tandem with Denmark’s military intelligence agency.
A pro-Russian hacker group called NoName057 said on social media it attacked Danish sites, including the Ministry of Transport and the public sector portal Borger.dk, as well as the defence group Terma, which confirmed it was attacked.
“We’re aware that a Russian hacker group has claimed that it (would) disrupt our website, as well as the ones of several Danish authorities, but it’s too early to say they are responsible,” Terma spokesman Tobias Brun-Falkencrone said.
“We are well geared to handle this kind of cyberattack and acted quickly. There were no security breaches and no data was lost,” he added.
On Nov 12, the same hacker group said it hit several Danish municipalities less than a week before local elections in the Scandinavian country, which is one of Ukraine’s most ardent supporters. AFP
