Spanish Police detained a 19-year old hacker allegedly responsible for a cyberattack against the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) committed in October 2022, the National Police stated on Monday
MADRID (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 03rd April, 2023) Spanish Police detained a 19-year old hacker allegedly responsible for a cyberattack against the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) committed in October 2022, the National Police stated on Monday.
"After a complex inquiry, cyberthreat investigation specialists under the General Information Commissioner have identified an individual responsible for these attacks who turned out to be a 19-year old man with a long work record in cybercrime," the police's statement said.
According to the police, the detainee allegedly used the information obtained by the attacks to create a database and to sell it later to third parties. The information in question is the tax data of around 500,000 Spanish citizens. Meanwhile, other public institutions were attacked as well, such as the National Police Corps, employment and social welfare services.
"The scale of the implemented attacks and tremendous amount of personal data that he handled made this person a very serious threat to National Security," the police stated.
Spanish citizens have been subject to cybercriminals' attacks more than once recently. On March 5, ambulance services, a laboratory and a pharmacy were damaged as a result of attack on the Barcelona Clinic hospital. The hackers responsible demanded a ransom of $4.5 million from local authorities in exchange for keeping the obtained data concealed. In addition, the ministry of science said the Spanish National Research Council had been attacked on July 16-17, 2022. Last year, cybersecurity company ESET said Spain, Turkey, Russia, Ukraine and Japan faced the most active online bank hacking threat.
In view of this, in February 2023, the Spanish Defense Ministry established the first Military Cyberoperations School in the country, an education center providing advanced training in cybersecurity. Moreover, at the end of March the Spanish Government allocated 149 million euros ($162 million) in funding for the deployment of three cybersecurity centers.
