The cyberattack against the university has taken the form of a ransomware attack.
Published: FEBRUARY 12, 2023 10:44
The Technion University, Israel's top technology school and a center for cyber security education, was hacked on Sunday by a new seemingly anti-Israel group calling itself DarkBit.
Although the cyberattack has taken the form of a ransomware
attack, the substance of the threat and demands by the group indicated
potential ideological opposition to Israel as an "apartheid" state. Alternatively,
the group could be entirely criminal and any ideological reference could be a
secondary move to distract investigators or simply increase their
notoriety.
So far DarkBit has demanded 80 Bitcoins, or NIS six million
to call off the ransomware attack, with a threat to raise the amount by 30%
if they do not receive the demanded sum within 48 hours.
Army Radio said that all exams would be postponed pending
resolution of the hacking attack.
The Israel National Cyber Directorate (INCD) said it is
"in touch with the Technion to get a full picture of the situation, to
assist with the incident and to study its consequences."
"The field of higher education has been a central target
for cyber attackers, with the INCD identifying 53 [serious] incidents of such
attacks in 2022, most of which were prevented," said the authority.
How will INCD handle
the situation?
In addition, the authority said it has held meetings with
higher education officials to create greater awareness about what they need to
do to defend their institutions from such hackers.
At the same time, Israel currently has no comprehensive
cyber law, which leaves INCD's powers lacking in many areas, including regarding
higher education.
Under current Israeli law, the INCD can only impose binding
cyber defense standards on a few dozen fields defined as "critical
infrastructure", such as electrical and water authorities.
In contrast, the INCD can recommend certain standards to
universities, but has no power to compel them to follow through.
It was unclear as of Sunday afternoon what vulnerability at the Technion had led to an embarrassing hack of
such an elite science university, although the school said classes could
continue somewhat normally, provided students switched to taking notes by hand
in an old-fashioned way, or at least disconnected their laptops from the
university network.
In addition, it was unclear how many classes would actually
be able to run normally with interruptions in digital services given the
university's technology focus.
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-731327
No comments:
Post a Comment