Canadian Government Faces Cyber Threats as Indian Hacker Group Targets Military and Parliament Websites

Canadian authorities have reported a series of cyberattacks on sensitive government websites, with evidence pointing towards an Indian hacker group as the potential culprit. Canada’s Federal government is coping with cyberattacks as an Indian hacker group claims responsibility.

This week, the Canadian Armed Forces reported that its website went unavailable to mobile users on September 27 however it was restored moments later. The military claims the website is separate from other government sites such as the one used by the Department of Defence and internal military networks.

“We have no indication of broader impacts to our systems,” said the military who confirmed the matter is still under investigations.

Subsequently, various pages on the House of Commons website are taking extremely long to load or failing to load at all citing the ongoing cyberattack which officials claim it started at the beginning of the week.

The House of Commons clams to be facing a distributed denial-of-service attack which involves bots swarming a website with multiple visits and causes the website to stop loading.

“House of Commons systems responded as planned to protect our network and IT infrastructure. However, some websites may be unresponsive for a short period. The House of Commons IT support team, in collaboration with our partners, have implemented mitigating measures and restored services to appropriate service levels. The IT team is still continuously monitoring for such activities,” said spokeswoman, Amélie Crosson.

A hacking group going by the name Indian Cyber Force has claimed responsibility for the unfortunate incidences. The group also appears to have penetrated a number of websites owned by small and medium businesses in Canada.