JERUSALEM: Hackers have launched an assault on Israeli websites, but the damage has been minimal as the Jewish state is prepared to fend off such attacks, one of the country’s top cyber experts said yesterday.
The hackers associated with the activist group Anonymous reportedly hit the websites of the premier’s office, the defence ministry, the education ministry and the Central Bureau of Statistics, among others, but all appeared to be running normally.
“As of midday (0900 GMT) the sites of the government of Israel are available to the public, as they have been all weekend,” the finance ministry said in a statement. It said the education ministry site had been temporarily out of action “because of a technical fault which has been fixed.” It did not elaborate.
Later yesterday, the foreign ministry website was also “paralysed for a few moments before returning to normal,” the finance ministry said, warning of possible slowdowns or temporary cuts on official sites. Speaking to army radio, Professor Yitzhak ben Israel, head of the National Council for Research and Development, said the scope of the damage to Israeli sites was “more or less non-existent”.
“That’s because of our preparedness in advance,” said Ben Israel, who founded the National Cyber Bureau which operates out of the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Ben Israel said it was highly unlikely that Anonymous was seeking to do real damage to the country’s key infrastructure.
“Anonymous doesn’t have the ability, nor is it its aim to destroy the country’s essential infrastructure. If it was, it wouldn’t have announced it in advance,” he said, indicating the aim was probably to stir debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. AFP
