Hackers hit UK government websites

NEWS Govtalk.gov.uk, the site for intergovernmental communication run by the e-envoy's office, was a prime target for the hackers, who posted their own graphic on the site with the words "Owned by PoizonBOx". The group has also targeted the nas.gov.uk site, an archive service for Scotland. Local government sites, including Havant.gov.uk, Walsall.gov.uk, and Wiltshire.gov.uk have also been hit. The attacks happened late last night and this morning. The PoisonBOx hacker group specialise in targeting government websites, according to German hackwatch site alldas.de. They have previously targeted such online properties in Australia, Ecuador, Egypt, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, the Ukraine and the US. A spokesperson for the cabinet office said: "We're waiting for a report from the service providers." A full statement is due later today. She did confirm, however, that the site conformed to the Communications-Electronic Security Group standards at the time of its launch. At the time of writing all the affected local government sites had been restored, but the govtalk site was still offline - the cabinet office promises to have it back up this afternoon. The nas.gov.uk was still proudly displaying the hackers' logo at 14:00 (GMT) this afternoon. David Johnson, head of information systems at Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council, said that they had managed to restore the site minutes after the attack happened. He confirmed they were using Microsoft's Internet Information Server, and that they had changed all the passwords, but that they were unlikely to make major security changes to the site. "It depends on the hassle factor, and the cost," he said. "As you know, local government isn't exactly flush with cash." A cabinet office spokesman said: "All the information on these sites is in the public domain. No confidential information has been compromised, and this is nothing more than an irritating piece of cybergraffiti."