Labour Party Claims It Was Hit By Large-Scale Cyberattack

The Labour Party has said that its digital platforms have been subjected to a “sophisticated and large-scale cyberattack”, just weeks before the general election.

The political party said it has reported the cyberattack to the UK national cyber security centre (NCSC), which is part of the UK’s GCHQ.

The news comes amid ongoing reports of state-sponsored attacks. Last month the NCSC warned that Russia, China, Iran and North Korea pose ‘strategic national security threats to the UK’.

Labour Party hack

Now it seems the Labour Party has become the latest victim after it claimed it was targetted.

“We have experienced a sophisticated and large scale cyber attack on Labour digital platforms,” a Labour Party spokesperson was quoted as saying by the Guardian newspaper.

They added that it believes no data was breached as a result.

“We took swift action and these attempts failed due to our robust security systems,” the spokesperson reportedly said. “The integrity of all our platforms was maintained and we are confident that no data breach occurred.”

“Our security procedures have slowed down some of our campaign activities, but these were restored this morning and we are back up to full speed. We have reported the matter to the national cyber security centre,” the spokesperson said.

The party has not specified which of its platforms were targeted, but the main Labour Party website, as well as its Facebook and Twitter accounts, are still functioning as normal.

The reported attack comes amid widespread concern at outside forces trying to influence elections in Western countries.

Russian attacks?

Russia in particular has been identified by US officials as trying to destabilise and influence the outcomes of elections.

Earlier this year Microsoft warned that Russian hackers Fancy Bear were hitting European democratic institutions.

Microsoft said at the time that it had detected attacks against employees of multiple think tanks and non-profit organisations working on topics related to democracy, electoral integrity, and public policy.

These attacks had affected staff in Belgium, France, Germany, Poland, Romania, and Serbia.

The attacks came before the European Parliament elections, as well as several key national elections across the continent.

Do you know all about security? Try our quiz!