Consumer NZ Website Encounters Hack

According to a news released by Website Consumer NZ, it is asking other site operators to be vigilant, especially those using SQL databases. The warning comes after Consumer NZ was compromised during the July 5-6, 2008 weekend.

According to the company, on late night of Saturday, July 5, 2008, its site was attacked with an SQL injection, which crept as an automated virus that contacted visitors with a Trojan.

The company further reported that the attack was discovered for the first time when a member employee examined the Website at 4pm on July 6, 2008. To stop further fallacies, he at once shut down the site.

Following the site going offline, Consumer NZ conducted a detailed audit using the services of a security consultant working independently. The audit detected a few problems that the Website's technology partners subsequently addressed to make the site completely secured.

Meanwhile, elucidating the attack, David Naulls, Deputy Chief Executive said that Consumer NZ asks sorry for the inconvenience caused by the problem and it is doing everything to amend it. He also said that the company has engaged a group of IT consultants as well as other independent security consultants to examine the attack and bring back the site to normalcy, as reprted by consumer.org.nz on July 15, 2008.

Naulls further emphasized that people who accessed the site when it was under attack were not at risk if they had the latest version of their operating system along with up-to-date anti-spyware and anti-virus software on their computers.

Now after the attack, Consumer NZ is informing all its users who accessed the site during July 5-6, 2008 about the form of the recent attack and steps they could take to safeguard their computer. The company is also notifying all the subscribers of its Website about the problem via e-mail as well as posting an announcement on consumer.org.nz. Finally, it has reported to the Police e-crime center.

Meanwhile, the IT professionals, who conducted the audit, said that the attack was similar to those on the Websites of Queensland Government and Sony PlayStation in the recent past.

Related article: Consumers Losing to Phishing More in 2007 than 2005-06

» SPAMfighter News - 28-07-2008

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