Published on Jan 23, 2015
Global News Montreal — Quebec provincial police are investigating the apparent hacking of the Terrasse-Vaudreuil town website by a group that claims to have connections with Islamic extremists.
On Thursday morning, the 2,000 or so residents of the small town on Île Perrot, just west of Montreal, woke up to find that the municipality’s official website now featured a message from a group claiming to be the Middle East Cyber Army.
The main page of the site featured text that read: “We are Muslims. Quran is our book. In Allah we trust. For Allah we work. Screw you Charlie Hebdo. Islam is and always will dominate!!! Islam is the truth!!! That’s why Islam is the fastest growing religion!!! #OPFrance.”
The message was signed by “The greatest – AnaCoNdA – kh.mar.404 – RebelGhost DX – Scream4.0.4 – Silent Killer – Hamooda El Bess – & ALL MUSLIMS.”
The hacking was apparently first noticed by a local journalist on Thursday evening at around 9 p.m., and the website’s regular content was restored early Friday morning.
In December last year, the Little Rock School District website was hacked by a group also claiming to be the Middle East Cyber Army.
#OPFrance appears to be one of the hashtags used by hackers who carried out what has been described as the “unprecedented surge” of cyberattacks against thousands of French websites in the aftermath of the shootings in Paris.
The head of cyberdefense for the French military,Adm. Arnaud Coustilliere, said about 19,000 French websites had faced cyberattacks, some carried out by well-known Islamic hacker groups, including MECA: Middle East Cyber Army, Fallaga team and Cyber Caliphate.
– With a file from The Associated Press
Key Points
- Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) are a real problem for both the Canadian and American Government when it comes to data theft.
- APTs are highly sophisticated hackers that are State-backed or funded whose top priority is breaking in undetected and stealing sensitive & classified information.
- The Canadian Government plans to spend $100,000,000 over the next year in upgrades and additional security measures to keep hackers out. But will it keep out highly sophisticated hackers out?
- China will continue to try and breach Canadian government computers & critical infrastructure
- It is better to track than to shut down (learn patterns and behaviors) says Terry Cutler
- Chinese state-sponsored actor
- $100-milllion to fight hackers not enough – expert says
- important to make sure that your website has all software up to date, patches applied, with strong passwords, and regular health checks
