NASSAU, Bahamas, May 18 2015 – A Tunisian Islamist “activist group” called the Fallaga Team was responsible for hacking two government websites on Wednesday, the Ministry of Tourism said.
Out of caution, all government websites have been checked for possible breaches and “reinforced against potential vulnerabilities by the implementation of software patching,” a statement from the ministry added.
As part of its long-term strategy, the government intends to convene a meeting of industry experts to review the government’s websites to find the best safeguards to protect future attacks.
The statement provides some insight into revelations first made by Prime Minister Perry Christie on the floor of the House of Assembly on Wednesday. Mr Christie initially told parliamentarians that the Ministry of Tourism’s website had been hacked, an incident which Mr Christie had said poses enormous national security implications for the country.
The ministry revealed that two websites had been compromised: www.bahamas.com and www.bahamasfilm.com.
According to the statement, the hacks occurred on Wednesday morning.
“All defaced sections of the government-owned websites were quickly removed and a corrected version redeployed and with the restoration of all compromised pages, all affected websites are now back to normal modes of operation,” the ministry said.
In the House of Assembly Wednesday, Mr Christie said a similar hacking incident occurred in another Caribbean country.
Although he did not name the country, international reports have noted that the government website of St Vincent and the Grenadines was hacked earlier this month by a purported “Islamic State.”
A message was posted on the St Vincent government’s website claiming that an “Islamist rebel group” had hacked the site. “Visitors to the website were greeted by a message saying ‘Hacked by Moroccanwolf – Islamic State’ and a photo of a man firing a machine gun from the back of a pick-up truck,” said.
