Killnet DDoS attacks averted by US Treasury

Reuters reports that the U.S. Department of the Treasury was able to avert distributed denial-of-service attacks deployed by Russian hacktivist group Killnet last month. Killnet, which admitted to having launched DDoS attacks against various U.S. states' and airports' websites last month, attempted to compromise the Treasury Department's critical infrastructure nodes days before it attacked U.S. financial services firms, according to Todd Conklin, who serves as Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo's cybersecurity adviser. JPMorgan Chase & Co has been claimed by Killnet to be among its victims although the bank noted that its operations have not been affected. "[The attack] confirmed that we're on the right track with how we're trying to actually share tactical information with the sector in real time with the mind that we are interconnected and face the same threat actors," said Conklin, who noted that IP addresses leveraged in the Killnet attack have been immediately shared with financial services entities.