Hackers took an entire country offline
The problems are huge
The island nation of Vanuatu in the South Pacific has been almost offline for two weeks after a cyber attack on the country’s servers. The hackers took down the websites of Parliament, the police and the Prime Minister’s office, as well as the email system, the intranet and the databases of schools, hospitals and other services.
About 315,000 residents living on different islands cannot pay bills, taxes, get permits or travel visas.
Most government services were forced to turn to manual operations or simply shut down. Many employees use personal emails and internet hotspots to do their work. Instead of wire transfers, payments are made by check.
The servers were hit on November 4th. Reports speak of a ransom demand from the hackers, which the government refused to pay, however there is no official position yet.
If you hit the state internet, everything is affected. Do you want to do missions? You have to go to customs and get approvals. It affects airlines. It affects the health system. There is nothing that is not affected.
The government has asked Australia to help restore its network. As for the reasons why the country was targeted, there is much speculation. The new government was elected just a month ago. Vanuatu supports West Papua’s independence movement in Indonesia and many speculate that the strike came from Indonesia. Others note that the country’s location is of geostrategic importance to the US and China, with the state having close relations with the latter due to massive investments. However Australia (US ally) has been providing aid and security to Vanuatu for 4 decades.
