New Zealand’s stock exchange faced disruptions for four consecutive days due to cyberattacks – hits sufficient enough to warrant further cooperation with security agencies
On Tuesday this week, the New Zealand exchange was hit by distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks which aims to disrupt servers by overwhelming them with excessive internet traffic. NZX faced trading disruptions since and resumed on Friday afternoon.
The DDoS attacks forced halted trading to cash markets and other trading operations such as debt and derivatives were also disrupted.
Alarms Sounded
Although no details were provided, authorities in New Zealand noted the severity of the issue and said it had already called for assistance from the Government Communications Security Bureau, an intelligence gathering and analysis unit, and the national agency for combating cyber crime.
«I can’t go into much more in terms of specific details other than to say that we as a government are treating this very seriously,» said Grant Robertson, the country’s finance minister, according to a «Reuters» report citing a media briefing.
Previous estimates by New Zealand’s central bank mark annual profit loss tied to cyberattacks at 2-3 percent in the banking and insurance industry each year.
