Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly’s department declined to identify a potential culprit, but cybersecurity expert David Shipley said he would guess a foreign country is behind the hack.
The Department of Global Affairs said the rest of its computer systems remain operational.
“On-site employee connectivity in GAC buildings is fully functioning, allowing for normal computer/network access,” the department said. “Employees working remotely in Canada have been provided with workarounds to ensure they remain operational.”
This is the best summary I could come up with:
For the second time in two years, Canada’s Foreign Ministry has fallen victim to a cyberattack that has forced the government to shutter part of its computer systems.
Mr. Shipley noted that last July the U.S. government announced hackers linked to China had for months gained access to e-mail accounts at entities such as the U.S. State Department.
In early 2022, Global Affairs was hobbled by a computer disruption that lasted close to one month – a cyberincident that came shortly after CSE warned of possible Moscow-backed cyberattacks on Canadian critical infrastructure and as Western countries prepared economic sanctions in the growing expectation that Russia would launch a fresh military assault on Ukraine.
Mr. Shipley said he will be interested to see whether Canada names the culprit behind this latest cyberattack once it determines who did it, “to call it out as a violation of international norms.”
In December, CSE warned China and Russia are carrying out most of the disinformation campaigns aimed at disrupting elections in democracies such as Canada – a threat that is becoming increasingly difficult to combat.
Canada’s next federal election is scheduled for the fall of 2025, but a campaign could take place before then if the New Democratic Party were to withdraw its support from a pact with the minority Liberal government.
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