On Sunday, The U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Department suffered a cyberattack intended to slow down its systems, as reported by Bloomberg. The attack consisted of a classic DDoS attack, where the hosting server is hit with an abundance of requests for an extended period of time.
The attackers appeared to have little success slowing down the systems. Nevertheless, it is possible that the attackers merely used a DDoS attack to mask their primary motives, but as with any attack, there are lots of unknowns. Very few parties are willing to talk.
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Telling of this is the National Security Council's following tweet regarding fake quarantine messages surrounding the coronavirus:
Text message rumors of a national #quarantine are FAKE. There is no national lockdown. @CDCgov has and will continue to post the latest guidance on #COVID19. #coronavirusMarch 16, 2020
"The NSC tweet was related to the hacking and the release of disinformation, according to one of the people," Bloomberg said. "The government realized Sunday that there had been a cyber intrusion and false information was circulating."
At this time, it seems that no data was obtained during the attacks, according to one of Bloomberg's anonymous sources.
Neither U.S. HSS Department nor officials from the NSA or U.S. Cyber Command have revealed who was behind the attacks, but Bloomberg said that "administration officials assume that it was a hostile foreign actor" despite lacking proof.
