Government websites easy targets in escalating India-Pakistan cyber war targets

With the escalating cyber war between Pakistani and Indian hackers, a group which calls itself the Indian Cyber Army (ICA) has gained access to scripts of more than 375 websites belonging to the Pakistani government, high-level organisations and important personalities in Pakistan, according to Pakistani newspaper, Express Tribune.

Indian and Pakistani hackers continue to attack important public and private websites to avenge attacks from the other side. Last week, a group calling itself Pak Cyber Army (PCA) targeted around 300 Indian websites even as the ICA issued a warning that it could hack another 375 Pakistani websites till 31 December, 2010 (See: Indian group hacks 35 Pak websites on 26/11 anniversary).

The Pakistani authorities are serious about the threats and a special cell under the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), the National Response Centre for Cyber Crimes (NR3C) has been formed to monitor Pakistani web sites, especially those of the government according to Imam Ghani, project director NR3C.

He said the cyber crime wing of FIA had already recovered 36 hacked websites.

According to Ghani, to enforce preventive measures, and avert attacks on public websites, a standard operation procedure detailing hosting parameters had been prepared and it would be issued to all government institutions soon.

Initial investigations had revealed that a suspect arrested by the FIA on charges of hacking the personal website of president of Pakistan Asif Ali Zardari in early December, had established links with Indian hackers, which led to the current episode of a cyber war between the two countries.