05 Aug 2011
Indian government suffers wave of computer attacks
Between January and June 2011, hackers defaced or otherwise compromised 117 Indian government websites, a government official has announced.In a written statement to the Lok Sabha, India's lower house of parliament, Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology Schri Sachin Pilot acknowledged the widespread hacking and outlined steps for improving the security of government sites.
One of the highest profile attacks occurred in June 2011, when hacker group Anonymous penetrated the Indian government's National Informatics Center to protest the disruption of political activist Baba Ramdev's hunger strike.
Pilot said all affected government agencies were told to furnish server logs to the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, which recommended security fixes to address specific vulnerabilities hackers had been able to exploit.
Among other provisions for ensuring network security, Pilot said all new government websites will continue to be evaluated for security standards before going live, and evaluation will continue periodically after sites are on the web.
A recent study found India was the point of origin for the seventh-highest percentage of worldwide internet attack traffic during the first quarter of 2011.