Dehradun (Uttarakhand) [India], August 2 (ANI): A cyberattack targeted the websites of 10 Uttarakhand government departments, including the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund, on Saturday, forcing authorities to temporarily take them offline.
After several hours of restoration efforts, the Information Technology Development Agency (ITDA) successfully restored the affected websites using backup data.
ITDA Director Alok Pandey said that several departmental websites were hit by a malware attack, but the situation was brought under control within a short period.
Following the malware attack, ITDA’s cybersecurity team immediately launched a response. As a precautionary measure, the affected websites were taken offline. Since secure backups had been maintained at the state data centre following the major cyberattack in 2024, ITDA was able to restore services after a few hours of intensive work.
The departments whose websites were affected include the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund, Public Works Department (PWD), Food and Civil Supplies Department, Uttarakhand Renewable Energy Development Agency (UREDA), State Tax Department, ESIC, Transport Department, and Tourism Department.
This is the first significant cyber incident since Uttarakhand’s largest cyberattack in October 2024, when nearly 90 government websites, including the Chief Minister’s Helpline, were knocked offline for several days. ITDA had gradually restored those services after extensive recovery efforts.
Officials believe that the strengthened cybersecurity measures implemented after the 2024 incident helped prevent Saturday’s attack from causing more widespread disruption. (ANI)
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