Hackers attack the Euromillions lottery

Hackers attacked the French site for the Euromillions lottery last weekend. Visitors to the site hoping for a flutter found messages in both French and Arabic warning them of the evils of gambling – with a hacking group called ‘Moroccanghosts’ claiming credit for the attack.

Clearly a group of hackers with an ideological objection to gambling thought that the most effective way to get their message across would be to destroy the Euromillions website. But is this just the start of a wider trend?

During the Occupy demonstrations various hacking groups took pleasure in flexing their muscles by vandalising the websites of companies they had an issue with – usually a particular complaint such as tax avoidance. If a company were perceived to be dodging tax by shunting profit and loss around the world so tax could be paid in the most favourable locations then it would be fair game for an attack.

It’s now a serious risk for any company, even those who pay their taxes and look after their employees, because it doesn’t need to be ideologically disgruntled hackers that destroy an online corporate footprint – it could be rival firms or governments who want to cause maximum damage to the reputation of an organisation.

This has all led to IT security becoming a considerably more complex area than just a few years back where the focus was on virus and worm control. Now, industrial espionage doesn’t need to be performed by spies wearing black jumpers and carrying tiny cameras – if a corporate system is not secure, hackers can just go straight in through the virtual front door.

And even now, the law offers scant protection in this area. Of course it remains illegal to mount a hack on a corporate website, but when the attack can be launched from anywhere, can be automated, can be masked through various anonymous hops around the world, it’s one area of business where hoping for the law to help is no real protection at all.

 

Photo by Jaina licensed under Creative Commons