The country in statistical "land"/ INSTAT database out of order, experts: Attacks are becoming more massive

2024-02-06 08:32:00, Aktualitet CNA

The country in statistical "land"/ INSTAT database out of order,

Illustrative photo

The data base of the Albanian Institute of Statistics (INSTAT) has not been active since January 31, when the group of hackers announced that it had attacked the servers and the web.

After five days of the attack, the detailed data of the country's official statistics on population, economy, trade, education, health, etc. are not accessible. At best, their absence blocks work for a series of fields and sectors whose activity is based on data processing and analysis.

A day ago, INSTAT announced to the media through an email that after the cyber attack that occurred on January 31, 2024, the official website www.instat.gov.al has been reopened. In the following days, the official website will be updated with the latest information, INSTAT continued in his announcement.

In the foreign trade section, the last two months of 2024, November and December, are missing, but meanwhile the database providing detailed data is out of order.

Over the weekend, hackers announced that they have access to 10 terabits of complete data, including the Census data.

IT experts who have worked with public systems explained that the extent of the damage depends on the time the hacker group has been in the system. The longer the stay time, the greater the damage, which also includes access to Back-up systems.

These systems serve to save data on separate servers in case of an attack on the systems being worked on. The expert explained that hacking methods have evolved a lot in recent years, while there are very few IT professionals and system users do not have the basic culture to protect themselves from attacks.

"In recent years, email hacking has become aggressive. Employees receive an email from the boss, opening which gives hackers access to the system," said the expert. This type of method is being massively applied to businesses in the last year, which are being sued for fines.

The expert said that since the systems were changed in the National Information Agency, in many institutions there are no IT employees in the organization. The presence of IT in public entities is necessary to control and train users, but also to control networks since attacks are now happening in this way, he explained.

Before the attacks, INSTAT failed to conduct and publish on time the preliminary data of the 2023 population census.

The last census was the most expensive in history, with around 13 million euros and 7,500 people activated, which according to the government and INSTAT were applied in order to publish the results as quickly as possible. However, in the history of the transition, this was the first census in which the deadlines for the publication of preliminary data on the population and housing in December 2023 were not respected.

The data on the country's population figure is urgent to correct all other data that are produced and that have meaning only when compared to the country's population./ Monitor Magazine