The Carinthian state government and the Carinthian district authorities could not be reached by e-mail for almost six full days in May due to a hacker attack. On Wednesday, the state press service called on the population to send e-mails again.
Specifically, emails that were sent to the state government or one of the district authorities between May 24th, 9:00 a.m. and May 29th, 11:00 p.m. should be sent again, but via the “Forward” button. This is how the original date should be understood.
The group “Black Cat” has claimed responsibility for the hacker attack. She was able to capture extensive data, which she says she has now sold. In a statement published online, the hacker group stated that it was about Covid test results, scanned passports and emails, including from Governor Peter Kaiser (SPÖ). They were sold because the country “didn’t cooperate”, i.e. didn’t pay the five million dollar ransom demanded.
Whether this is true cannot be verified. The state of Carinthia had admitted that the hackers had “read” 250 gigabytes of data, but it was still unclear how much of it was copied. A 5.6 gigabyte data set has already been published twice, so it is questionable whether it could still be monetized. Whether that was the only data that was stolen is still unclear.
