The standardization body for telecoms, ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute), has just been the victim of a data leak, the organization announced in a press release published last week. The non-profit structure, installed in the Sophia-Antipolis technology park (Alpes-Maritimes), was more precisely the victim of the theft of the list of users of its portal.
As ETSI explains, attackers would have exploited a vulnerability against its portal, a computer system dedicated to the work of its members. Questioned by The Record, ETSI did not want to specify whether it was a known vulnerability or an undisclosed flaw, a zero-day.
Assistance from ANSSI
Alerted, ANSSI, the State cyber fire brigade, intervened to assist the organization. “Since the attack and under the direction of ANSSI experts, ETSI has corrected the vulnerability, undertaken additional security actions and significantly strengthened its IT security procedures,” the standardization body also specifies.
The structure therefore asked users of its online services to change their passwords. A notification was sent to the CNIL, in accordance with the structure’s obligations. And a complaint was also filed, the case now being followed by the specialized section of the Paris public prosecutor’s office, the court told ZDNET.fr.
Unknown motives
ETSI did not specify whether it believed it had been the victim of an attack involving espionage or whether it was more simply an attack primarily involving simple cybercrime. The theft of a list of users could be a first step to penetrate more widely into the organization’s information system.
But the attackers may also have been looking for specific identifiers. The organization brings together more than 900 structures, from more than sixty countries, to work on new telecommunications standards. Work that places it at the “vanguard of emerging technologies”, and in particular on security issues, the subject of one of its flagship events, a thematic conference lasting several days in mid-October.