The G20 Portal witnessed an astounding 16 lakh cyberattacks per minute during the summit held in September, according to the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) CEO. Rajesh Kumar revealed this information during the annual conference, stating that the attacks began as soon as the website went live and reached their peak during the summit. With the assistance of various Indian agencies, the I4C successfully fended off these attacks and ensured the website’s security.
Kumar also expressed concern over non-national foreign threat actors utilizing Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to mask their identities. These actors were detected attempting cyberattacks from locations such as China, Cambodia, and Malaysia. However, pinpointing their exact locations remains challenging due to the anonymous nature of VPN networks.
Cyber experts suggest that such attacks, called Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, are usually orchestrated by non-national threat actors to disrupt and sabotage websites. It is possible that these attacks have originated from foreign countries.
The G20 summit, the eighteenth meeting of the G20, took place at Delhi’s Bharat Mandapam International Exhibition-Convention Centre on September 9-10, 2023. Kumar also shared statistics on cybercrime complaints, revealing that over 31 lakh complaints had been registered on the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal since its launch in August 2019. Law Enforcement Agencies of states and union territories registered more than 66,000 First Information Reports (FIRs) based on these complaints.
During the conference, Kumar highlighted the I4C’s efforts in preparing an analytical report on the modus operandi of the top 50 cyber-attacks during 2023. Additionally, he emphasized the role of the National Cyber Helpline Number 1930, which had helped save over Rs 1,100 crore in defrauded money within three years, benefiting 4.3 lakh victims.
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