Expert comments on Norway government cyber-attack

The Norwegian government has confirmed that its ministries were recently hit by a cyber-attack.

The office of Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre as well as the foreign, defence and justice ministries were not affected – these departments are said to operate using a different IT platform.

Erik Hope, who leads the government agency in charge of providing services to ministries, told a press conference: “We identified a weakness in the platform of one of our suppliers.

“That weakness has now been shut.”

Government cyber-attacks: “Common and persistent”

Commenting on the significance of this government cyber-attack, Nadir Izrael, CTO and Co-Founder, Armis said: “Attacks on government agencies worldwide are becoming more common and persistent.

“This is due to the widespread disruption and trickling impacts potentially caused by these attacks on critical infrastructure and society overall, if successful.

“Geopolitical tensions are only exacerbating these threats to agencies, as cyber-warfare has proven to be a cost-effective method of attack for disrupting the everyday lives of civilians.

“Armis continues to warn that these attacks should be seen as a wake-up call.

“It’s critical that government agencies globally prioritise putting technology and procedures in place to proactively address this risk and reduce vulnerabilities to the ever-expanding attack surface.

“This starts with visibility into the entire attack surface itself, along with real time and contextual insights for keeping a constant pulse on what’s connected to the business network at any given time.

“If you cannot see and do not know that a vulnerability exists within your environment, then you cannot proactively mitigate this risk before a malicious actor exploits it.”