14 DAY TRIAL // The official website of Victorian Treasurer Tim Pallas was compromised a few hours ago by a Tunisian hacker group in protest against the war in Syria which led to the killing of innocent people.
The group, which is known as Tunisian Fallaga Team, hijacked the website and posted a message that read “Stop killing people in Syria,” with two attached hashtags, namely #Op_Russia and #save_aleppo.
The attack was launched by “Mr O.Jz and Hetler Tn and Fallag Kill3r,” according to a message posted on the website, and also included photos and videos of Syrian attacks that were published on the index page. Furthermore, hackers also embedded a video posted on YouTube that showed armed men and women fighting in the war in Syria.
The included messages accused United Nations military forces of “deliberately killing” men, women, and children in eastern Aleppo, eventually calling for the war to stop as soon as possible.
Several attacks recorded in the last months
A government spokesperson explained that site administrators have already regained control of the page and revealed that IT experts were working to boost security of all websites operated by Australian authorities.
“The website was hacked this morning and has now been fixed, work is underway to improve security of MPs' websites,” the spokesperson was quoted as saying.
Additionally, Labor Party Assistant State Secretary Kosmos Samaras revealed in an interview with AAP that hackers attacked several other websites belonging to the government because political websites are seen as a very efficient way to spread a message.
“We're just in the process of moving to a more secure system. If it continues then we'll have to consider talking to the authorities about it,” Samaras explained.
The website was restored after approximately 30 minutes, according to Australian officials, and no other data was compromised. Australian authorities now expect several other similar attacks, especially against websites of Labor MPs.