Ministry pulls down website after hackers post Besigye photo
SOURCE: THE DAILY MONITOR, 1 MARCH 2012
The website of the Ministry of Works has been pulled down after a hacker posted a picture of FDC leader Kizza Besigye seated on a stool in a rather pensive mood.
The image stayed superimposed on the site for several hours yesterday until authorities shut down the website at about 5pm. It is the second time in as many months that the website has been hacked into and pulled down as a result.
Web visitors had been greeted by a post on the site’s front page that read: “Welcome to Ministry of Hackers and Jobless Ugandans Republic of Uganda.”
Works ministry’s Senior Information Scientist Isaac Ojok admitted in an interview that he was dumbfounded by the hack job. “I really don’t understand this. I have just seen this,” he said.
“I have escalated the issue and contacted the people who host us.”
“I have escalated the issue and contacted the people who host us.”
It is understood that local firm, Uganda Home Pages, manages the ministry’s website, as well as several other government sites. The Ministry of Works website was redesigned in August 2011 after being hacked into a few months earlier.
A hacker going by name Kaka Argentine posted a photo of Adolf Hitler with a Nazi party symbol on his chest on the State House website in May 2010. A year earlier, hackers calling themselves “the Ayyildiz team” posted pro-Palestine items on the website of the Ministry of Defence, accusing Israel of killing innocent Palestinians.
No one has since claimed responsibility for the Works site hacking. “It is beyond our responsibility,” said Mr Ojok, when asked how the hackers were able to breach the website. “The database is not with us. It is with our service providers.”
“They called us and we are sorting this out,” said an official at Uganda Home Pages who could only identify himself as Ernest.
Officials at the National Information and Communication Technology Authority (NITA) admitted that it would be difficult to apprehend the hackers. “That is one of the biggest challenges,” said NITA spokesperson Charlotte Ampaire. “The hackers may not even be in Uganda.”
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