Photo: Thomas Winje / TT
on Saturday crashed several of the biggest news sites in what is believed to be a coordinated denial of service.
the attacks were directed against Expressen and Aftonbladet, but also hit large a number of other newspapers that share infrastructure with the two tabloids: the attack against the Bonnier-owned Expressen meant problems including DN, DI and Sydsvenskan, while the attack on Aftonbladet affected other companies in the Schibsted group, as SvD.
Ever since we revealed näthatarna of Flashback, we have been exposed to various threats.
Peter Andersson is an administrator of the Research Group website. During Saturday night, he read about the problems of tabloid sites and discovered that although the group’s own site had problems. He logged on and saw that the first peak traffic was already 16:50 in the evening, a few hours before the attacks on Aftonbladet and Expressen launched. At 19:30 also lay down their website.
– Ever since we revealed näthatarna of Flashback, we have been exposed to various threats. But we had not observed any indications that someone was willing to attack our site right now, says Peter Andersson.
The articles on the internet hate Flashback built on the Research Group researches and published by the Times. The group has also collaborated with the Expressen newspaper, which published their digging job on the anonymous näthatarna in the comment field of sites that Avpixlat, Exposed and free times. For that job was awarded Research Group of the Journalist Award guldspaden.
– This means that we often paired with Aftonbladet and Expressen, says Peter Andersson, who argue that it can not be ruled out that it was a coincidence that they were attacked the same night as the tabloids, but it seems unlikely.
This means that we often paired with Aftonbladet and Expressen.
Among hackers, and experts on cybersecurity described the attack as “amateurish”. Several sources speculate that it concerns one or more young, Swedish offenders without deeper knowledge of IT security. The weapon may well be software that is openly available on hacker forums, and the subject is assumed to be dissatisfaction with the newspapers’ lies and distorts the truth. “
The speculation is based on a Twitter message that” the most Likes “by the pseudonym @_notJ. It reads: “Basically create false articles to beautify the immigration to Sweden”, and links to a Daily Mail article about “the Swedish conspiracy to hide the truth about the refugee influx.” The specific Twitter account has been associated with the attack because it is only a few minutes after the attack on Aftonbladet.se initiated tweeted: “This is what happends When You spread false propaganda. Aftonbladet.se #offline “(sic).
At 19:25 on Saturday night Aftonbladet hit by the first overload attack, a very aggressive DDoS attack. DDoS stands for “distributed denial of service” and is a major attack against the network or computer system. Then also hit Expressen, which also seems to be the main target with Aftonbladet.
One or more hackers create a so-called “botnet” by cutting a large number of connected computers by means such as Trojans. The computers used are of “secondary interest” in the investigation, which is now underway, says Anders Ahlqvist IT crime specialist at the National Operations Department, Noah, who has investigatory by the police.
Those behind trying to hide themselves to avoid detection, and perhaps enabled malware only for a small period in order to prevent detection.
– a way that is common is that via a malicious code infect computers and then take control of not only the individual computer without a network-wide, to later send information back to the attacker. Those behind trying to hide themselves to avoid detection, and perhaps enabled malware only for a small period in order to prevent detection, says Anni Bölenius.
She says approach of this attack is “easier” and that it had no intention to be secret during the attack.
– the responsibility here lies not with us but with MSB and police said Bölenius.
on Wednesday, the government to hold a meeting with invited representatives from the major media houses in Sweden. The focus will be on how media companies should work to similar attacks can be averted.
Minister Anders Ygeman think that media companies need to take a serious think about how they have built their IT security.
– We are extremely serious about this attack. When it happened, so we took a number of actions and we still do. We regard this as a priority security issue and we can not tell you exactly what steps it is all about, says Fredrik Lindén, Communications Manager for Schibsted, which owns Aftonbladet and the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet.
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