Network Security News

Korean hackers, MyDoom worm suspected in DDoS attacks

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Government websites in the U.S. and South Korea were hit by a major cyberattack beginning on July 4, which intelligence officials believe were launched by hackers sympathetic to the authoritarian regime in North Korea.

U.S. officials told the Associated Press that websites for the Treasury department, the Secret Service, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Transportation were hit by a sustained distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS) over the holiday weekend.

South Korean intelligence officials said a botnet of 18,000 infected computers located on the Korean peninsula was used to launch the attacks, according to the Korea Herald.

A series of attacks on South Korean government sites began on Tuesday, including the sites of the office of the president, Cheong Wa Dae and the National Assembly, Ministry of Defense and Shinhan Bank and Korea Exchange Bank, the newspaper reported.

Amy Kudwa, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team issued a notice to federal departments and "advised them of steps to take to help mitigate against such attacks," according to the AP.

Web security researchers from AhnLab said the attack could have been spawned by PCs infected with a version of the MyDoom worm, according to IDG News Service.