Aug 3 — In Taiwan, a series of cyber attacks temporarily interrupted access to Taiwanese government websites. Access to the website of Taiwan’s presidential office was unavailable for roughly 20 minutes.  Two other portals were temporarily taken offline in order to allow experts to assess possible damage.

DDoS attacks

In a statement, the Taiwanese officials said that websites had experienced up to 8.5 million traffic request per minute from a “large number of IPs from China, Russia and other places.”

Hacktivists

Attacks appeared uncoordinated and are presently believed to be the work of politically motivated hacktivists. Historically, such attacks have persisted for a few days, but hackers lose interest after a week.

Reports indicate that a similar cohort of IP addresses had been scanning the internet for low-level, easily exploitable vulnerabilities since Friday, and that the activities did not manifest as government-sponsored.

Geopolitical tension

The attacks occurred in a politically tense moment. According to Reuters, Taiwan is currently preparing its air-raid shelters as tensions with its neighbor escalate. Senior officials in Taipei say that the events in Europe brought a renewed sense of urgency around designating shelters and preparing for conflict.