Technology

Posted on October 31, 2018 by staff

FIFA hit by ‘illegal’ cyber-attack

Technology

Football’s world governing body FIFA was hit by an “illegal” cyber-attack earlier this year.

The hack targeted its email systems and there is no indication as to what kind of information was stolen.

However the organisation has been contacted by media outlets in recent months asking for comment on internal information contained in private exchanges.

President Gianni Infantino, questioned on the type of information that could be released, responded: “The questions we received, we answered.

“My job entails having discussions, having conversations, exchanging documents, drafts, ideas, whatever, on many, many, many, many, topics. Otherwise you don’t go anywhere.

“I mean, if I just have to stay in my room and not speak to anyone and cannot do anything, how can I do my job properly?

“So if then this is being portrayed as something bad, I think there’s not much I can do more than my job in an honest way, in a professional way and trying to defend the interests of football.”

A FIFA statement said it “condemns any attempts to compromise the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data in any organisation using unlawful practices”.

“Of course, we are concerned by the fact that some information has been obtained illegally,” it said.

This month the US Department of Justice and the FBI revealed that Russia’s military intelligence body was responsible for a hack on FIFA in 2016.

That attack led to evidence from anti-doping investigations and lab results being published.