Tokyo Olympics alert against threat of "cyberattacks"

Tokyo Olympics organizers announced that they are in a constant state of alert about cyber attacks, but they have not yet suffered from "a major impact" after Britain accused Russia of targeting the upcoming Games next year.

The British Foreign Office said that Russian spies attacked Olympic organizers, logistics and sponsors, before the Games were postponed for a year due to the outbreak of the new Corona pandemic. Tokyo 2020 officials said that they had taken a set of countermeasures against the digital attacks, but did not disclose the details, citing concerns. a wish.

A statement by the organizing committee said today that "while we were continuing to monitor various types of cyber attacks on the digital platforms owned by Tokyo 2020, no significant impact was observed in our operations," but stressed that it is prepared to face this type of attacks.

The British accusations came as six Russian military intelligence officers were accused in the United States of launching cyberattacks on the Ukrainian electricity grid, the French elections in 2017 and the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, in 2018.

The British newspaper "The Guardian" pointed out that the supposed digital reconnaissance on Tokyo 2020 included phishing attacks, which are deceptive messages that appear as if they were from a trusted friend or business, but contain malware.

The newspaper pointed out that the planned attack also includes creating fake websites and searching the wishes of individuals' accounts.

Japanese Olympic Games Minister Seko Hashimoto refused to comment directly on the report Tuesday, but said that "since the London Olympics, cyber attacks have increased."

The US Justice Department pointed out that the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics were targeted after Russian athletes were prevented from participating under their flag, due to government-sponsored doping operations.

"Their cyber attack combined the emotional maturity of a naive child with the resources of a nation-state," she added, adding that they tried to pin the accusation on North Korea.

"There was a hacking operation on the opening day, but we could not confirm its source," former Pyeongchang Chief Executive Lee Hee-biom told AFP.

Follow our latest local and sports news, and the latest political and economic developments via Google news