Several German airports have had their websites disrupted, experts are investigating a possible online attack. The pro-Russian hacking group Killnet is suspected. The problems arise after a major computer failure of the Lufthansa company. This will have left thousands of passengers stranded at Frankfurt airport.
Airports need to strengthen the protection of their systems
“Once again, airports have fallen victim to large-scale DDoS attacks,” said Ralph Beisel. managing director of the airport association ADV, said in a statement. “According to the information we have so far, the other systems are not affected,” he said.
What we know so far
Among the airports affected were Düsseldorf, Nüremberg, Erfurt-Weimar and Dortmund, among others. Websites were either inaccessible or reported with failure messages.
The websites of the largest German airports, in Frankfurt, Munich and Berlin, were functioning normally.
There are reasons to suspect that it could be a hacker attack
Nuremberg Airport said its site had received so many requests that it had collapsed. The website of the German news magazine Spiegel reported that the problems could have been caused by a DDos attack, in which hackers direct heavy Internet traffic to targeted servers in a relatively simple effort to knock them offline.
No effects on air traffic have been reported.
Frankfurt Airport, one of Europe’s biggest airports, has experienced travel chaos after damaged cables at a construction site caused a computer system crash, with more than 200 flights cancelled.
Killnet hackers are also active in France
Cyber-denial of service (DDoS) attacks against European institutions have multiplied since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine. In France and Europe, attacks of this kind against the sites of institutions or administrations are increasing. During the French presidential campaign of 2022, killnet hackers had already claimed to be at the origin of the breakdown of Emmanuel Macron’s site, denouncing “France’s support for Ukraine”.
