Edinburgh University Hit by Major Cyber-Attack

Edinburgh University Hit by Major Cyber-Attack: The website of University of Edinburgh was still seems to be down at the time of writing after the university has attacked with a major cyber-attack during its Freshers’ Week.

A spokesman of Edinburgh University has told the Edinburgh Evening News that it has “rigid measures in place” to protect the IT systems and the data.

“Our defenses reacted quickly and no data has been compromised,” he added. “We will continue to work with our internet service provider, [national cybercrime investigator] and with other universities to prevent these network attacks in the future.”

The main ed.ac.uk site that seems to be still down on Thursday morning, nearly around 24 hours after the very first reports of an attack went online. That would probably indicate the serious DDoS attack.

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Jisc, UK non-profit organization who runs the super-fast Janet network specially for research and the educational institutions, which released a statement that claims a “number of universities” have been targeted this week and adding the number of DDoS attacks on them “Typically increases at this time of the year, when students are enrolling at, or returning to university.”

“While Jisc is responsible for protecting the connections to the Janet Network for its members (Colleges, Universities and Research Centres), members are responsible for protecting their own cyberspace,” it added. “However, Jisc also provides DDoS threat intelligence to its community and provides the advice to members affected by cyber-attacks on how to deal with the problem and minimize the impact.”

Unexpectedly, Edinburgh University was praised by government this year for carrying out the cutting-edge cybersecurity research. It is for sure one of the 14 Academic Centres of Excellence in Cyber Security Research, backed by £1.9bn National Cyber Security Strategy.

DDoS attacks grew every year about 40% in the very first months of 2018, according to the new figures from Corero Networks.

The Security researchers has also claimed that the attacks are becoming shorter — with over 82% lasting less than the 10 minutes — and smaller, with over 94% under the 5GBPS. However, one in every five victims are hit with another attacks within 24 hours, the report has revealed.