hacker

Hackers target Mediapart

France

Mediapart was on Thursday targeted by a computer attack which made access to the site difficult or, for some, impossible. Responsibility for the attack was claimed by a Franco-Israeli hacker who operates under the alias of Ulcan, and follows recent attacks led by him against French website Rue89  which were coupled with vicious hoax phone calls targeting its journalists and which have had serious consequences.

by La rédaction de Mediapart

French minister: 'Why I banned Gaza protests'

France — Interview

In an interview with Mediapart the French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve has justified his controversial decision to ban a number of planned protests over the Israeli war against Gaza. In doing so Cazeneuve insisted that it was his decision to ban those demonstrations, and not that of the president François Hollande or prime minister Manuel Valls. The interior minister insisted his ministry had “concrete evidence” that synagogues and Jewish businesses were going to be singled out in those protests. During the interview Cazeneuve also said he had often joined marches in the Palestinian cause in the past and “would have done so again” had he not been in office. Fabrice Arfi, Louise Fessard and Mediapart's editor-in-chief Edwy Plenel report.

by Fabrice Arfi, Louise Fessard and Edwy Plenel

'It was child's play': how a hacker broke into MEPs' secret email accounts

International — Investigation

A hacker using elementary computer equipment and what he described as “a few bits of knowledge that everyone is capable of finding on the internet” has succeeded in accessing confidential emails and personal files of Members of the European Parliament, their assistants and even the institution’s IT experts, Mediapart can reveal. The operation was, he said, mounted as a demonstration of the vulnerability of security at both the parliament in Strasbourg and also among many national administrations which use software, notably that of Microsoft, that experts have for years warned is exposed to espionage manipulations through fundamental - and what some suggest are possibly deliberate - flaws. While the scandal of mass surveillance employed by the US National Security Agency continues to unfold, Jérôme Hourdeaux reports on how major public institutions like the European Parliament continue to expose themselves to almost mundane intrusion of confidential data.

by Jérôme Hourdeaux