Thaindian News

South Korean websites are again under attack from cyber terrorists, with one of the country’s biggest banks, a leading national newspaper and South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, all being targeted.

The attacks are a third wave assault following similar attacks earlier this week, which targeted South Korea’s presidential Blue House, the Defense Ministry, and some banking sites.

A similar attack on July 4th was launched against key US federal government computer systems, including the Pentagon, the National Security Agency, the White House, the New York Stock Exchange, the Department of Homeland Security, and the State Department, to name just a few.

The latest attack, which is currently in progress, is causing the country’s internet service providers (ISPs) to fight off what appears to be a deliberate attempt to shut down key websites.

The Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attack is seeing thousands of virus-infected computers hijacked and simultaneously directed to a particular site, overwhelming it with the sheer volume of traffic.

The current attack is slowing down or paralysing the internet operations of large organizations and while inconvenient for them and their customers, is not believed at this stage to present any other security threat.

While South Korean internet and security experts believe the attack could be the work of North Korea, or North Korean sympathizers in the South, there has been no proof as yet to substantiate this view.

However, some intelligence reports claim North Korea has a long-established military unit, employing up to 1,000 skilled computer hackers, for exactly this type of project.

In response to the ongoing disruption South Korea has announced that it will speed up plans for a cyber warfare unit to counter such threats.