Attempted cyber-attack against University of Cyprus foiled before causing damage

06:59 - 03 March 2023

Current Affairs

An attempted cyber-attack against the University of Cyprus (UCy) was foiled before causing any damage, as University services were able to cut off the system and prevent the “worst case scenario”.

University of Cyprus Rector Tasos Christofides confirmed the information to CNA. “There was an attack. Luckily we were able to pre-empt it, so no big damage was done. We are trying to restore the systems,” he said. He said it appeared to be “an organised attack that has been taking place in many universities, in Israel mainly, and in hospitals. Usually these people have some goals, to extort for ransom”. He noted that the UCy hadn’t received any such demands.

Christos Charalambous, Head of the University's IT Infrastructure Service, said an unauthorised access to non-critical systems was detected in the early hours of Thursday morning. It was deemed “suspicious traffic” that could lead to malicious damage, he said, and so “we isolated the University” to protect critical systems.

Charalambous noted that all checks were done and at first glance no damage was found. “You can't be 100% sure. A secure system is only a switched off system,” he said, adding that access has already been restored internally, the wireless network was connected to the internet, while some services, such as email, telephony and some cloud services were not interrupted. External access to the University's website was expected to be restored over the course of the day.

The head of the ΙΤ Infrastructure Service also said they had worked with the Digital Security Authority, whose input had been “very helpful.

(Source: CNA)

Attempted cyber-attack against University of Cyprus foiled before causing damage

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