New Delhi: Amid the rising India-China border tensions and a phishing attack alert by the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), a key Indian government business department's website was hacked on Monday.
The site of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), which has been responsible for curtailing FDI of Chinese companies into India, had a Chinese letter showing on its screen that seems to mean "meditation".
However, the website has now been restored.
A senior official of the DPIIT, that comes under the Ministry of Commerce, told IANS that their website was indeed hacked. However, no official would confirm or deny the same on record. When the Ministry of Commerce was contacted, officials there, speaking on conditions of anonymity told IANS, that the matter is being looked into.
The official added that the ministry is considering releasing a statement. A screenshot of the hacked website is available with IANS.
This choice of the website to attack is significant, given the overriding mood of the Indian public to hurt China though economic means. Earlier, India decided to put Chinese investments through the government route, instead of the automatic route drawing Chinese ire. It was DPIIT which was responsible for the decision.
In fact, a statement issued by the Chinese embassy in India said: "On April 18, India's Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) revised its foreign investment policy, making it much difficult for companies from countries sharing land border with India, including China, to invest in the country."
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This hacking also takes place immediately after the CERT-In issued an advisory, warning that the potential phishing attacks could impersonate government agencies, departments and trade bodies. It stated: "Phishing campaign is expected to impersonate government agencies, departments and trade associations who have been tasked to oversee the disbursement of the government fiscal aid."
"It has been reported that these malicious actors are planning to spoof or create fake email Ids impersonating various authorities," it cautioned.
This Chinese attack on India's key trade website also comes in the wake of reports that the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) may put a ban on procuring telecom supplies from Chinese companies, when it comes to state-run telecom companies like the BSNL and the MTNL.
Disruption in website due to routine update, no hacking: DPIIT
The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) clarified that its website faced some disruption due to routine update and there was no incident of hacking.
The website of DPIIT was not available for some time in afternoon on Monday while a logo showing the portal in maintenance mode was being displayed.
The suspicion of hacking arose due to a symbol that appeared on the DPIIT website, which resembles a Chinese/Japanese character, with a note that the site is under maintenance.
"It is clarified that NIC-DPIIT team had put the site on the routine maintenance mode in the forenoon of 22nd June. The logo on the maintenance site of DPIIT that appeared was that of a Japanese company which created the site long ago," the Commerce and Industry Ministry said in a statement.
"This is to inform that DPIIT website is now running on NIC cloud and the site was recently security audited. No data loss/hacking took place in the DPIIT website today during maintenance," it added.
(Inputs from IANS and PTI)
