Ministry of National Defense Website Hit by DDoS Attack... Possible North Korea Involvement

Ministry of National Defense: "Rare Incident, Currently Operating Normally"
Focusing on Identifying the Attacker... Russia and North Korea Likely

A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack occurred on the Ministry of National Defense website. The Joint Chiefs of Staff website also experienced unstable access, and the Cyber Operations Command is currently verifying whether a DDoS attack is underway.

According to the Ministry of National Defense on the 6th, a DDoS attack was launched on the Ministry's internet homepage starting around 5:30 PM the previous day. The Joint Chiefs of Staff website also experienced unstable access, prompting the Cyber Operations Command to check for ongoing DDoS attacks. A DDoS attack is a hacking technique that generates excessive traffic instantaneously, making normal data transmission difficult and causing web pages to go down.

The military is responding with a DDoS defense system, and the homepage is currently operating normally. However, while access to the Ministry of National Defense website is possible, partial slow connection speeds or intermittent disconnections are repeatedly occurring.

A military official stated, "The IP addresses from which the attacks are originating have been blocked," adding, "DDoS attacks against the Ministry of National Defense are rare."

The Ministry of National Defense is focusing on identifying the perpetrators of the DDoS attack. Earlier, the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) warned on the 1st that cyber threats are increasing due to North Korea’s troop deployment to Russia and recommended strengthening security measures against DDoS attacks by Russian hacking groups.

Consequently, there is speculation that this attack may have originated from Russia or North Korea. DDoS attacks were frequently used during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In December last year, Ukraine’s payment services were targeted by DDoS attacks, and various Ukrainian government and private institutions became targets of Russian hackers. On the 1st, Ukrainian intelligence claimed to have launched DDoS attacks on Russian banks, paralyzing their online banking services.