Titre suggéré : “La Colombie touchée par une cyberattaque massive visant les sites gouvernementaux”

A massive cyber attack has been targeting government websites in Colombia since Tuesday, with at least thirty affected so far, with consequences in several other Latin American countries, according to Colombian sources.

This cyber attack targeted the main telecommunications service provider of the Colombian state, the company IFX Networks, according to a statement from the presidency. The government has urgently set up a “unified cybersecurity command center (PMU Ciber), in order to assess the damage and resolve the effects of the incident that affected several entities,” explains the statement.

“We are examining which other public entities may have been affected, in order to determine the real impact in Colombia. It is important to clarify that the incident occurred against the service provider IFX Networks, and not against public entities,” said the Digital Directorate of the Colombian presidency.

“This external ransomware attack (a type of malicious program that encrypts data and makes it accessible for ransom) affects 762 companies in Latin America, with IFX providing data to a total of 17 countries on this continent,” adds the text.

According to the national press, it extends to Argentina, Panama and Chile, and its consequences would be “gigantic”. A total of 34 Colombian state entities are affected, including the ministries of Health and Justice, with two million judicial procedures currently paralyzed, according to the press.

Citing a digital security advisor to the presidency, the newspaper El Tiempo assures that “cybercriminals have diverted information (…) from the Ministry of Health and the judiciary,” demanding a ransom “in cryptocurrencies.”

“This attack can be considered the largest on infrastructure in Colombia in recent years,” commented another government advisor for digital on the X network, Saul Kattan, who called for the urgent creation of a national agency for digital security.

In a statement, the Ministry of Health stated that it is “implementing alternative mechanisms to ensure the continuity of the operation of the health sector nationwide, in order to minimize the impact on the functioning of the affected applications.”

Several hospitals’ websites in the country are already blocked, according to a Colombian account on X specializing in hacking and cybersecurity. On Thursday, the Ministry of Culture announced that its various sites “were no longer available.”