A cyberattack reportedly originating from a pro-Russian hacker group struck the websites of more than a dozen major airports in the United States Monday morning, ABC News reports.
Individual airport websites were hit with denial of service (DoS) attacks which blocked customers from accessing information they provide such as departure times, cancellations and gate information. Affected airports included New York's LaGuardia, Los Angeles International and Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International.
The websites were down temporarily and are unrelated to security or air traffic control.
According ABC News, John Hultquist, head of intelligence analysis at cybersecurity firm Mandiant, said the pro-Russian hacker group Killnet was behind the attacks. Killnet has been operating during the Russian war on Ukraine and generally targets websites in Europe.
The group has also taken credit for recent attacks on state government sites in the U.S., including those of Mississippi, Kentucky and Colorado.
Some Twitter users wonder about the relative importance of airport web pages in the first place. "How many Americans even use airport websites?" wonders @JELesq. "Is this a fundamental misunderstanding of how air travel works in the West?"
"You can also use the airline's app, which is generally better," @JELesq continues.
Other Recent Airport Cybersecurity Events
Airports and airlines worldwide are a frequent victim of cyberattacks and other Internet problems, according to Stormshield, a European cybersecurity company. Their vulnerabilities are the massive financial cost of disrupting air travel and the inconvenience that can be inflicted on a massive amount of customers in a short period of time.
Airline technology company SITA said its servers were attacked in March 2021. The incident led to a "data security incident involving certain passenger data that was stored on SITA Passenger Service System (US) Inc. servers, which operates passenger processing systems for airlines," wrote Asian Aviation. "The company said it took 'immediate action' after it confirmed the attack and contacted affected customers."
In April 2020, Prague Airport said it thwarted a number of cyberattacks.
"Attempted attacks on web pages of the airport were detected in preparatory phases," the airport’s spokeswoman said in an emailed statement at the time, according to Reuters. "That prevented their spreading and all further phases that could have followed and potentially harm the company."
In March 2020, two San Francisco International Airport websites were attacked.
"Two login portals – one reserved for employees, the other for partners and service providers – at San Francisco International Airport were reportedly hacked in March 2020," reported Stormshield. "Malicious code was injected on these two sites in order to harvest the usernames and passwords used at the time of login. The number of accounts exposed is not yet known, but the airport took immediate preventive measures and reset all the passwords of its employees and customers."
British Airways suffered a massive customer data leak in 2018 when thousands of customers attempting to reach its official website were redirected to a fake one.
"Over a two-month period, cyber criminals were apparently able to collect the personal data of 400,000 people, including banking data," reports Stormshield. "In addition, the usernames and passwords of a number of British Airways employees, along with access to administrator accounts belonging to IT teams, were also allegedly exposed."
Subsequently, the airline faced a $26 million fine because of its weak network security that allowed the hackers to attack it.
