Pierluigi Paganini November 20, 2012

Hacktivism attacks will not change Israeli policy but for sure their operations could represent a dangerous cyber threat for any government. Anonymous has started a cyber offensive against Israel to protest for the attacks on Gaza, the hacktivists have defaced and  taken offline hundreds of websites, such as The Jerusalem bank and Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and have exposed information stolen during the hacks.

The complete list of web sites attacked has ben published on Pastebin, a second list related to a Phase 2 of the attacks has been also published on the same website.

According Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz over 44 million hacking attempts have been detected from the beginning of the operation #OpIsrael, although most have not been successful.

The Minister highlighted that non-government web site reported serious damage, the offensive has created problems primarily to private companies, small business is usual more exposed to cyber threats due limited economic resource.

It cannot be ignored that in the past the impairment of subcontractors infrastructures has made possible the exposure of sensible information. Majority of attacks hit governmental sites including the Home Front Command and Prime Minister’s Office with poor efficacy.

The Israeli minister also explained that many attacks have been originated in Europe and US, it’s impossible to assign to the offensive a specific geographic connotation, today (11/19) another Pakistani hacking group also came forward in support of GAZA by taking down multiple big Israeli sites and deface all Microsoft related Israeli domains including Bing, MSN, Skype, Live and other.

The government’s chief information officer, Carmela Avner, confirmed that many attacks were of DDoS type, the servers suffered an impressive number of request simultaneously:

“we haven’t seen many attempts to enter sites and steal data. Most of the attacks have been of the type where hackers try to overload servers with excessive data.”

In an official communicate Anonymous representative have expressed all their rage against Israel condemning its publicly threat to shut down all lines of communication in and out of Gaza.

“But when the government of Israel publicly threatened to sever all Internet and other telecommunications into and out of Gaza they crossed a line in the sand. As the former dictator of Egypt Mubarack learned the hard way – we are ANONYMOUS and NO ONE shuts down the Internet on our watch. To the IDF and government of Israel we issue you this warning only once. Do NOT shut down the Internet into the “Occupied Territories”, and cease and desist from your terror upon the innocent people of Palestine or you will know the full and unbridled wrath of Anonymous. And like all the other evil governments that have faced our rage, you will NOT survive it unscathed.”

On AnonPast the group of hacktivist has also published further declaration on the Israeli attacks:

“Greetings Citizens of the world, This is Anonymous. It has come to our attention that the Israeli government has ignored repeated warnings about the abuse of human rights, shutting down the internet in Israel and mistreating its own citizens and those of its neighboring countries. November 2012 will be a month to remember for the Israeli defense forces and internet security forces. Israeli Gov. this is/will turn into a cyberwar.”

The hackers haven’t limited their operation to defacing but they have also violated every target not properly secured exposing private info of tens of thousands of Israeli citizens and personal data of 5,000 Israeli government officials.

Forbes web site reports:

“Another three thousand email addresses, phone numbers and addresses of those Anonymous described as “Israeli supporters”–again taken from an unknown source–were posted online Sunday, including the information of some U.S. congressional representatives. And several thousand more users’ email addresses and other personal data were taken from seemingly random Israeli targets like the real estate website Dirot Modiin, Connections Magazine and the mailing list of what another Anonymous release described as the “Israel Coalition.”

As usual a great source of statistics on the attacks is represented by the web site OZDC that analyzed the leaked data providing meaningful information of the #OpIsrael.

Anonymous is expressing its full solidarity with the Palestinian people, the interest is high to the point that some have even suggested an infiltration of members of Hamas among its members, I exclude that possibility, on internet is also circulating the news that Anonymous has created “care package” containing contains information on evading IDF surveillance for residents of Gaza to use if Israeli will attack Internet connections.

The challenged IDF published on-line a portal to fight “misinformation” concerning the IDF and Israel. The site propose a game that involve visitors in every kind of on-line activities aimed at providing a positive image of the state. The Web site provides also documentation on the attacks on Gaza and information about attacks that Israel suffers as shown in the following pictures.

The site proposes the following description for game:

“IDF Ranks is an interactive game, directly implemented into all of the IDF’s social platforms allowing YOU to be a virtual part of the IDF. Every action you take — reading, commenting, liking, sharing or even just visiting — will earn you points and help you climb the ladder of IDF Ranks. Specific actions will win you beautiful badges, and one day you might even become the Chief of Staff of IDF Ranks.”

For sure the group of Anonymous will continue to the bitter end its offensive … at least until the attacks will not be interrupted.

My opinion is that Israel is conducting a so aggressive offensive on Gaza to verify the response of international community to its possible future military interventions, I obviously refer to a possible attack on Iran. The government is evaluating the efficiency of its war machine and also the interferences of other countries in its decisions.

I hate wars, there are situations that children should never live,  I dream a civil society but the hatred in the region is unlikely to bring peace.

Pierluigi Paganini