Public Health's website hacked over the weekend

The Department of Public Health's website is back up and running, this after being illegally accessed - not once, but an alarming twice. Agency director James Gillan confirms his agency's website was hacked over the weekend and then again on Tuesday.

"Somebody said they saw a ghost figure and some strange looking stuff. I don't know what was on there," he said. Gillan may be referring to AnonGhost, described as a group of pro-Palestinian hackers who have defaced websites like the United Nations last year. The group is reportedly based in Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

KUAM News was sent a screenshot over the weekend of Public Health's homepage, which was replaced by the AnonGhost graphic, a common signature left behind by hacker clans after taking control of a site. The group purporting to be AnonGhost wrote, "To all governments of the world we are watching you, we can see what you're doing, we control you, we are everywhere...we are everyone you depend on."

Said Gillan, "I didn't look at the website because if I saw things on there that were messing it up, I would be really upset."

According to Gillan, it doesn't appear that anything was taken off the site, but it does raise the issue of how the Government of Guam needs better cybersecurity. "One of the reasons I think that's happening is that we don't have a secure filter. We have a domain for this that we pay, GoDaddy, that sells a lot of domains, whatever. I don't know the website business. But all of our web activity is being run through the Department of Administration IT folks and they may still have some holes in their firewall."

Gillan fortunately adds that there's no confidential patient information on their site. The hacking activity is currently being investigated by the IT Division at DOA.