Cyprus’ government portal also targetted in cyberattack

Cyprus’ government portal was the victim of a cyberattack Sunday but the authorities coped with the incident successfully the Deputy Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digital Policy said in a statement.

The attempt by the hackers had to do with the accessibility of government websites and the information available on those websites, but it was not successful, the ministry explained.

The ministry said that the attack was successfully dealt with, after fast and coordinated actions of all the involved services.

Only the central portal gov.cy was affected for a few minutes, but no other individual website of the portal and no other state website or online service, the ministry clarified in the statement. This type of attack is called DDOS (distributed denial of service attack) and no breach has been achieved, the statement also reads.

It is added that all services remain on alert.

This is the sixth cyber-attack in three days.

Cyta, Cyprus Telecommunications Authority was also attacked Saturday, but its operation has not been affected, Head of Cyta’s the President of the Board of Directors, Maria Tsiakka Olympiou told the Cyprus News Agency.

She said that Cyta’s website was down for some time, because of the attack, but the organization dealt with the incident effectively and it remains vigilant.