Top Portuguese media group hit by hackers, websites taken down

One of Portugal’s top media groups said it was hacked by an organization known as Lapsus$.

Grupo Impresa said the hackers gained access to the company’s Amazon Web Services account, then contacted its subscribers, took down its websites and impacted its other online services, according to The Associated Press.

Hackers sent one message to subscribers that said, “Breaking: President removed and accused of murder: Lapsus$ is Portugal’s new president,” the AP reported.

However, the hackers did not demand payment, nor did any evidence indicate that they accessed subscribers’ passwords or credit card information.

The attack took place on Sunday, and the company restored its control of the cloud system later that day. However, Expresso, the company’s flagship newspaper, was still operating under a temporary site on Thursday, as were TV channels run by the company’s broadcaster, the wire service said.

Both Portuguese police and the country’s National Cybersecurity Center were investigating the incident. 

Media sites in Israel were also the recent target of a cyberattack.

Earlier this week, The Jerusalem Post said its website was hacked by a pro-Iranian entity. Because of the hack, the Post’s website depicted an image of a model Dimona nuclear facility being blown up with a message saying, “We are close to you where you do not think about it.” 

The same image also reportedly appeared on the Twitter account of Maariv, another Israeli newspaper that was hacked.