Experts believe that recovery will take more than one month…
In five municipalities (communes) of France, located near the Loire River on the west coast of the country, a large-scale cyber attack on local web servers occurred, as a result of which civil servants lost access to documents and the ability to do their work.
According to a statement on the city of Saint-Nazaire's website, the following communes currently have their web services disrupted: Saint-Nazaire, Donge, Pornichet, Montoir-de-Brittany and La Chapelle-de-Marais. All of them are located around the seaport and have a total population of about 100,000 people.
Local officials warned that recovery could take months. Meetings regarding this situation are held daily, which underlines the significance of the incident. The French cybersecurity agency ANSSI also provides all possible support to eliminate the consequences of the attack as quickly as possible.
According to the leadership of Saint-Nazaire, the attack occurred on the night of April 9. When local government employees came to work the next morning, they were asked not to turn on their computers or check their mobile phone emails.
Currently, the civil servants affected by the incident do not have access to their jobs, files and business software, and therefore they cannot perform their work.
"The attack will have significant consequences," warned Davy Samzen, the mayor of Saint-Nazaire. The e-mail and telephone systems of municipalities are currently disabled.
The nature of the incident has not yet been confirmed. It is not known for certain whether the attackers were able to steal the data of local residents or civil servants.
This incident follows a massive DDoS attack on a number of French government organizations in March. According to local authorities, the attacks began on the evening of March 10 and were characterized by unprecedented intensity. Nevertheless, experts quickly took measures to mitigate the consequences, so that the impact on most services was significantly reduced, and then completely restored access to them.
In five municipalities (communes) of France, located near the Loire River on the west coast of the country, a large-scale cyber attack on local web servers occurred, as a result of which civil servants lost access to documents and the ability to do their work.
According to a statement on the city of Saint-Nazaire's website, the following communes currently have their web services disrupted: Saint-Nazaire, Donge, Pornichet, Montoir-de-Brittany and La Chapelle-de-Marais. All of them are located around the seaport and have a total population of about 100,000 people.
Local officials warned that recovery could take months. Meetings regarding this situation are held daily, which underlines the significance of the incident. The French cybersecurity agency ANSSI also provides all possible support to eliminate the consequences of the attack as quickly as possible.
According to the leadership of Saint-Nazaire, the attack occurred on the night of April 9. When local government employees came to work the next morning, they were asked not to turn on their computers or check their mobile phone emails.
Currently, the civil servants affected by the incident do not have access to their jobs, files and business software, and therefore they cannot perform their work.
"The attack will have significant consequences," warned Davy Samzen, the mayor of Saint-Nazaire. The e-mail and telephone systems of municipalities are currently disabled.
The nature of the incident has not yet been confirmed. It is not known for certain whether the attackers were able to steal the data of local residents or civil servants.
This incident follows a massive DDoS attack on a number of French government organizations in March. According to local authorities, the attacks began on the evening of March 10 and were characterized by unprecedented intensity. Nevertheless, experts quickly took measures to mitigate the consequences, so that the impact on most services was significantly reduced, and then completely restored access to them.
