Five Macau government websites were attacked

According to several media reports, hackers took down five Macau government websites on Wednesday evening. According to the Office of the Minister of Security (known by its Portuguese initials GSS) – whose website was one of the affected sites – a criminal investigation has been launched to determine the source of the cyberattack.

The other four websites were those of the Public Security Police, Fire Department, Macao Public Security Forces Affairs Office and the Public Security Forces Academy. The SAR’s internet providers took at least 45 minutes to restore partial access to the websites, but CTM users were reportedly unable to access them for more than three hours.

GGS issued a statement saying the shutdown was caused by a “distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack from overseas.” It is not clear how many people were affected by the incident.

(See more: Cyber ​​attacks in Macau are increasing sharply, but most are thwarted)

Michael Gazeley, founder of Hong Kong-based cybersecurity company Network Box, told South China Morning Post that DDoS attacks are a cybercrime in which attackers flood a server with Internet traffic from a large number of devices in order to prevent users from accessing online services and websites.

“Hackers would take control of thousands of devices and then use them to attack a target,” he explained. “And then when the authorities show up, they look at the IP (Internet Protocol) addresses of the devices, not the hackers.”

Last November, figures from Macau’s Cybersecurity Incident Alert and Response Centre showed that the number of cyberattacks on Macau’s critical infrastructure had more than tripled since 2020 – but most of them were thwarted by the city’s cybersecurity systems.