Government of Switzerland

History

2024: Hackers shut down Swiss government sites

On January 17, 2024, the Swiss government reported a hacker attack on a number of state sites. The invasion disrupted access to some federal administration resources.

The official notification says that the cause of the failures was a DDoS attack. The hacker group NoName, which had previously attacked the Swiss federal administration, claimed responsibility for the cyber attack: it happened in June 2023. As a result of the new attack, the sites of a number of government departments and other structures were damaged. At the same time, the portal of the Swiss government remained operational.

Swiss government reports hacker attack on a number of state sites

Swiss authorities say NoName is allegedly a pro-Russian cyber group. It is alleged that the reason for the DDoS attack was the presence of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. The Swiss government said in a statement that the attack was expected ahead of the visit, so information security experts took additional precautions in advance.

According to Avast, a company specializing in the development of antivirus and security solutions, the NoName group, or NoName057 (16), has been operating since at least March 2022. Hackers control poorly protected computers around the world, using malware called Bobik to infect them. The group, as noted, carries out "politically motivated attacks" on government resources, transport companies, financial institutions, etc. The victims are organizations in Ukraine and in neighboring countries such as Estonia, Lithuania, Norway and Poland. According to Avast research, the group has a 40% chance of success, and companies with well-protected infrastructure can successfully withstand intrusions^[1]

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