Dark Reading is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC
This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them.Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.
The opening ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang were hit by a cyberattack, with unknown attackers targeting the games' various affiliated websites, as well as other properties and infrastructure, according to various reports.
As the opening ceremonies of the Olympics started in South Korea on February 8, the official website of the PyeongChang games, along with other infrastructure, such as WiFi in the stadium and television signals and Internet access in the press area, stopped working, according to the Guardian.
In addition, security company McAfee has been posting periodic alerts about the 2018 Winter Games, including reports of phishing attacks, malware and other issues.
The second wave of attacks targeting the Olympic Games are underway. While motives are unknown, we do know the attackers are very well organized. Details from @nicoleperlroth via @nytimes. https://t.co/TjUIAKqTK4
— McAfee (@McAfee) February 8, 2018
Although the cyberattacks hit during the opening ceremonies, it appears the Olympic officials have been countering the attacks and that the websites, as well as the WiFi and Internet access, are back up and running.
Olympic officials have declined to discuss the specifics of the attack or place the blame on those who might be behind it. It was suspected that any attack might be driven by North Korea, which is close to PyeongChang and may want to disrupt the games that are being hosted by rival South Korea.
However, North Korea is not the only suspect, according to early reports.
Multiple reports indicate that Russia, which was officially banned from the 2018 Winter Olympics although some athletes are participating, denied that the country is behind an attack, but may be a prime suspect.
"We know that Western media are planning pseudo-investigations on the theme of 'Russian fingerprints' in hacking attacks on information resources related to the hosting of the Winter Olympic Games in the Republic of Korea," according to a report from Reuters, citing Russia's foreign ministry.
While Olympic officials have been tight lipped about this particular cyberattack, media reports suggest that a full report will come after the 2018 games are complete in the coming weeks.
Related posts:
— Scott Ferguson, Editor, Enterprise Cloud News. Follow him on Twitter @sferguson_LR.
The 10 Most Impactful Types of Vulnerabilities for Enterprises TodayManaging system vulnerabilities is one of the old est - and most frustrating - security challenges that enterprise defenders face. Every software application and hardware device ships with intrinsic flaws - flaws that, if critical enough, attackers can exploit from anywhere in the world. It's crucial that defenders take stock of what areas of the tech stack have the most emerging, and critical, vulnerabilities they must manage. It's not just zero day vulnerabilities. Consider that CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog lists vulnerabilitlies in widely used applications that are "actively exploited," and most of them are flaws that were discovered several years ago and have been fixed. There are also emerging vulnerabilities in 5G networks, cloud infrastructure, Edge applications, and firmwares to consider.
Incident Readiness and Building Response Playbook
In this special report, learn the Xs and Os of any good security incident readiness and response playbook.
Tweet This
1 Comments
