back to article NHS site defaced with screed protesting Syrian conflict

A UK National Health Service (NHS) site on which the organisation posts patients' stories describing their experience with illness has been defaced by an entity calling itself “Moroccanwolf” who claims the attack is an act of protest regarding western governments' lack of humanitarian actions in Syria. Google's cache suggests …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Act one

    I think it is act three, scene two, where the database is compromised, by then we are expected to recognise the players without long introduction.

  2. Mark 85

    NHS?

    Were they even aware of the defacement prior to El Reg asking them about it? Governmental agency and all that....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: NHS?

      Doubt it from what ive seen around here. I think el reg should time how long it takes to be removed. My moneys on two weeks

    2. qwertyuiop

      Re: NHS?

      Yeah, 'cos private sector sites are so efficient and never get hacked.

      I mean, it's not like the Syrian Electronic Army hacked BBC News, the Associated Press, National Public Radio, CBC News, Al Jazeera, Financial Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Washington Post, Syrian satellite broadcaster Orient TV, al-Arabia TV, Human Rights Watch and sundry US defence contractors...

      Oh... wait...

      (Disclaimer: I don't work for the NHS or the public sector)

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Were these patient stories as made up as the #fakedwpstories? Just asking?

  4. Ralph B

    Well, I see their point ...

    I mean, why hasn't the UK's National Health Service website ever spoken up against the three years of massacres that occur in Syria?

    I don't recall seeing anything on the Marks and Spencers website about it either.

    Or on the Chessington World of Adventures website.

    They're obviously all complicit in the World's conspiracy of silence.

    Hack 'em all, I say!

    </sarcasm>

    1. Alister
      Joke

      Re: Well, I see their point ...

      More importantly, they haven't hacked the Norwich and District Dog Fancier's website, despite the NDDF being well known to have political weight in the region.

    2. TheProf
      Alert

      Re: Well, I see their point ...

      There's a McDonald's poster near my house that's been spray painted with 'Support the Refugees'.

      I for one am glad that someone is taking the time to bring these matters to the attention of the world and her fat hungry family.

    3. Turtle

      @Ralph B Re: Well, I see their point ...

      "I mean, why hasn't the UK's National Health Service website ever spoken up against the three years of massacres that occur in Syria?"

      Yes, but now that the website's been defaced, the whole world is going to sit up and take notice!

  5. David Pollard

    nhs.uk has been hacked for years

    It's quite hard to stop all inappropriate posts on an easily accessible comments forum that is mostly un-moderated, and it would be unreasonably expensive to moderate all the public comment areas full-time. However the people in charge of the NHS site don't seem too bothered about relatively minor hacks in areas which should not allow unauthorised access.

    A quick search for [site:nhs.uk paypal] alongside a few genuine links brings up a host of links for counterfeit goods such as Nike trainers, cialis and viagra. Although these seem to be being cleared fairly rapidly, mostly appearing only in Google's cache, this has been occurring for maybe a couple of years now.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: nhs.uk has been hacked for years

      https://leetsmirror.com/mirror_3793.html

  6. bpfh
    Mushroom

    I'm not sure what is worse...

    The fact that the government got another state site hacked, or the fact that the NHS has it's own version of TripAdvisor and probably paid through the nose for it - it's not as if people actually *want* to go to hospitals to have bits of them fixed or removed....

    1. graeme leggett Silver badge

      Re: I'm not sure what is worse...

      Patient choice - choice may be limited to Hobson's but at least with comments as on GP surgery reviews, you'll get an idea if the receptionist will be pleasant or if the wait to be seen is so long that you'll be forced to read Peoples Friend' having exhausted the leaflets and donated issues of lifestyle magazines.

      (genuine situation - ENT at local hospital waiting area had years worth of caravan reviews. By the time I was seen, I was on the point of ordering a towbar for my car.)

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I'm not sure what is worse...

        ENT at local hospital waiting area had years worth of caravan reviews

        That's why it is important to bring in publications you've read, to educate the other patients and raise the literary standards. I like to slip a copy of Viz amongst the Reader's Digests, golf magazines, and decades old Women's Own. Or a lad's mag would undoubtedly be appreciated by somebody, so long as the cover isn't too racy.

  7. koolholio

    Looks like the hacker has done other NHS sites previously:

    http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/id/23510379

  8. Anonymous Coward 101

    Aren't we getting on for 4.5 years of massacres in Syria?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Aren't we getting on for 4.5 years of massacres in Syria?

      I think so. But don't forget that the destablisation and massacring started in 2003 in neighbouring Iraq, and only reached Syria after the Yanks had poured petrol on the flames of sectarian conflict they'd enabled. So that's more like 12 years.

      1. TeeCee Gold badge

        And as the world's come over all hand-wringy at the sort of extremely heavy-handed military intervention required to keep a lid on it, long may it continue.

        Unless we can find a suitable psychopath to run the place and ensconce him with a heavily armed bunch of elite sadists to keep the theocrats ground down, I don't see a way forward.

        1. RosslynDad

          "Theocrats" - thanks for that addition to my vocabulary. Now my rants will be more articulate.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          http://www.progressive.org/news/2015/07/188249/how-us-can-solve-crisis-syria

          An interesting read

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mass immigration ... what could possibly go wrong?

    Part 94...

  10. Frumious Bandersnatch

    "We shan't link to the site ..."

    That's a bit of a departure for the Reg, isn't it? I mean usually (as far as I've noticed) you link to an archived copy of the defacement. What's different in this case?

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