TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — As China continued its saber-rattling by staging large-scale military exercises around Taiwan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Tuesday (Aug. 9) it had been hit by 170 million cyberattacks per minute during the height of the tension last week.
The hostile digital activity originating from outside Taiwan reached its peak Aug. 4-6, but MOFA experts succeeded in solving problems within the day of the attacks occurring, Foreign Minister Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) told an international news conference Tuesday.
As United States House Speaker Nancy Pelosi embarked on her Aug. 2-3 visit to Taiwan, IP addresses located in China and Russia launched up to 8.5 million views of MOFA and government websites a minute in an effort to paralyze them, CNA reported.
However, from noon Aug. 4, late at night, and early in the morning of Aug. 5, and early on Aug. 6, the cyberattacks took on a new, more complex shape while reaching a peak of 170 million per minute, according to Wu. Experts redressed the situation within the day the attacks happened, he added.
Wu emphasized that MOFA’s and other government departments’ websites were functioning normally for the moment, with internet systems having been adapted to face any further attacks.
