A hack targeting the Kenya Defence Force and other government websites
this week was in response to a cry for help regarding corruption. The
hackers are also concentrating their efforts against Israel in light of
the ongoing offensive in Gaza.
Anonymous may carry out more cyber attacks against the Kenyan government, one of its members has told RFI. Twitter accounts for Kenya's army spokesman Major Emmanuel Chirchir and
the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) were hacked on Monday. Messages such as
"violence produces violence" and "spending money on AK47s" alongside
images of hungry-looking children were posted.
"Someone asked for help and we work for people across the world," said a member of the Latin American-based Anonymous cell.
Talking via encrypted online chat software, an Anonymous member using
the handle Le Chiffre said that they "feel that there is a lot of
corruption," but people "don't pay attention to Africa".
He said that it was the first time his group, Anon_0x03, had hacked
targets in Africa, but it was a good idea and they would continue to
"take other parts of the world".
Explaining their methodology, the hacker said that they work on many
platforms and within different IT systems, in some cases they discover
that Twitter accounts are linked to government websites.
Besides Major Chirchir's Twitter account and that of the KDF,
Anon_0x03 also defaced the Reforms Kenya website, hit the Integrated
Financial Management Information System website and Ministry of State
for Immigration and Registration of Persons website. The Reforms Kenya
website remains offline as of Friday.
Anon_0x03, which is made up of 5 members across the Latin-American
region, denied that it had received any money for the hack, but instead
proclaimed that it was a "war". They said they sometimes receive
requests saying "hey Anon, we need help here".
In discussing other targets, Le Chiffre said that Israel was at the
top of their list as well as Brazil. He described Israel's offensive in
Gaza as "brutality from Israel army" which has made the government a
target for Anonymous, "a free for all".
According to the Zone-H website which tracks defacement attacks
against websites, the Anon_0x03 group has previously targeted websites
in Ecuador, Mexico and Thailand.
The last major attack against Kenyan websites was in 2012 when an
Indonesian hacker called Direxer reportedly took down 103 government
websites.
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