FBI: Iranian cyber attack on E-Albania continued for 14 months

FBI: Iranian cyber attack on E-Albania continued for 14 months

27. September 2022 0 Von Horst Buchwald

FBI: Iranian cyber attack on E-Albania continued for 14 months

Washington, 9/27/2022

The FBI has stated that Iranian hackers had access to Albanian systems for 14 months prior to the recent cyber attack. The statement is the result of a recent investigation following an intrusion that crippled E-Albania.

According to the joint statement with CISA, the hackers used their access rights to steal information from email traffic and deploy malware to wipe hard drives.

The threat actor believed responsible for the intrusion is identified as HomeLand Justice. After gaining access to the country’s critical digital infrastructure for 14 months, he launched a massive hacking campaign in July 2022 that crashed the entire E-Albania system. The latter is used for administrative tasks ranging from passport applications to tax payments.

 

In addition to this attack, the country was hit by another hacking campaign a few days later, when the border security verification system was crippled by a cyberattack.

According to the FBI, the attacker transferred between 70 and 160 MB of general data and 3 to 20 GB of server data.

The security breach led Albania to ask Iranian diplomats to leave the country within 24 hours. Shortly thereafter, Akbanua decided to sever its diplomatic relations with Iran as a result of the breach. The U.S. Embassy in Albania, NATO, the FBI, and other agencies have blamed and criticized Iran for the breach.

Iran has denied involvement in the breach.