California: State Internet Services Shut Down Over Hacker Intrusion

["Paul Ferguson" <fergdawg () netzero net>]

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Via The LA Times.

[snip]

A hacker who directed people from a county website to pornography triggered
a federal shutdown of state government Internet and e-mail service late
Tuesday afternoon, according to a spokesman for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The state system, which uses the domain name "ca.gov," was never hacked and
all of its websites and e-mail should be functioning within a few hours,
spokesman Aaron McLear said.

He said the federal government moved to suspend the state's Internet and
e-mail service after someone hacked into a county website that contained
the domain name ca.gov and redirected people to a pornography site. McLear
said he did not know which county website was hacked.

The unauthorized diversion of Internet traffic to pornography raised a red
flag for federal regulators, who moved to shut down the entire ca.gov
domain until California officials prevailed upon them to reverse the
suspension, according to McLear.

[snip]

More:
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-me-hackers3oct03,1,1328060.story

Note: This apparently involves some "*.ca.gov" county websites that
have been hacked and "mined" with malicious content -- there are
perhaps thousands of similar websites worldwide.

Ironically, the California State website: http://www.ca.gov/

...is online and live.

- - ferg

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--
"Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson
 Engineering Architecture for the Internet
 fergdawg(at)netzero.net
 ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/


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