Ireland’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has informed all government departments and agencies about the recent crypto mining malware that affected a number of websites.
According to a BBC report, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) went offline after a warning that hackers were taking control of visitors' computers to illegally mine ‘Monero’ cryptocurrency. Over 4,000 website have been reportedly affected by the malware.
The issue was traced to Texthelp’s Browsealoud plug-in, which helps visually impaired or partially sighted people to access the web. The plug-in was doctored to add a program – Coinhive – which mines Monero. Texthelp has confirmed the news, BBC said.
The NCSC said that it is aware that several websites using software from a third-party vendor caused visitors to those sites to mine cryptocurrency without their consent. It said:
“The software vendor in question took the necessary mitigation actions Yesterday (Sunday 12th Feb) afternoon to disable this service thereby preventing further compromise. There are no indications at this stage that members of the public are at risk.
“The NCSC has issued an advisory to all its constituents of Government Departments and Agencies as well as Critical National Infrastructure providers, informing them of the issue and outlining a number of mitigation tech steps to prevent similar types of incidence occurring in the future. The NCSC will continue to monitor developments in relation to this matter.”
