House website experiences 480M cyberattacks in one day

THE website of the House of Representatives experienced on Wednesday, March 13, 2024, 480 million cyberattacks, Secretary General Reginald Velasco revealed on Thursday, March 14.

In a statement, Velasco said the severe Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, which is aimed to make the platform unavailable to users, started at 8:50 a.m.

“This incident marks the first time our website has experienced a cyberattack of this magnitude. Within just one hour, we recorded over 53 million attacks, and by 4:36 p.m., the number had risen to over 480 million,” he said.

“The objective of this cyberattack was clear: to make our digital platform unavailable to users. This tactic temporarily succeeded, but we quickly addressed the issue,” he added.

Velasco said that according to their Information Communications Department, the majority of these attacks originated from various countries, including Indonesia, the United States, Columbia, India, and the Russian Federation.

He noted, however, that the accuracy of these locations may be questionable due to the potential use of Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) by the attackers, which can conceal their true origins.

Velasco assured that no information related to the normal operations of the House of Representatives was compromised while all institutional information remained secure, and no personal or institutional data was accessed or stolen.

“We have reported the incident to the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) for further investigation, particularly regarding the use of VPNs by the attackers. Additionally, we are accelerating the launch of a new, more secure website to prevent future vulnerabilities,” he said.

“This incident underscores the need for robust cybersecurity measures to protect our digital infrastructure. We are committed to improving our security protocols, closely collaborating with cybersecurity experts, and investing in advanced technology to guard against such attacks,” he added. (TPM/SunStar Philippines)