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Government websites down in four provinces, territories; cyberattacks blamed in two

Sep 14, 2023 | 3:42 PM

Government websites in four provinces and territories are shut down, with at least two jurisdictions blaming cyberattacks for their outages.

Internet searches of websites for Yukon, Manitoba, Prince Edward Island and Nunavut show those sites are inaccessible.

Prince Edward Island and Yukon say cyberattacks are behind their shutdowns.

Officials in those jurisdictions say attackers are using the so-called denial-of-service tactic, generating artificial website traffic to overburden servers.

Both say in news releases that the attacks have not compromised data but may hinder transactions at government service centres.

Manitoba says its interruption is due to network and server infrastructure and there is no indication it’s related to a cyberattack. 

Officials in three of the jurisdictions say teams are working to restore service.

The government of Nunavut wasn’t immediately available for comment.

On Wednesday, the Quebec government was hit with a denial-of-service-style cyberattack allegedly carried out by the pro-Russian hacker group NoName, with some government-linked websites down as a result.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 14, 2023.

The Canadian Press