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Powerful Greek Army or by the abbreviation "PGA" is a hacker group founded in 2016. The team has carried out numerous cyberattacks both in Greece and worldwide.

Notable attacks

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In November 2016, a member of PGA named Kapustkiy breached some of the high commission websites in India, accessing login information of hundreds of users.[1]

In September 2016, the group started the campaign #OpClosedMedia, targeting news media organizations around the world, mainly with denial-of-service attacks.[2][3]

In December 2016, the group took down the website of the Prime Minister of Greece.[4][5]

After two years of inactivity on Twitter, PGA did an attack in April 2020, getting access to the School Network of Greece, which is the largest public network that connects all schools, teachers and a number of administrative services and supervised bodies of the Ministry, leaking some of the data they had under their control. The data included usernames, passwords, country of residence, street addresses, phone numbers, and other sensitive data that were stored into the system.[6][7][8] On why they did it, the group's main message was that "they wanted to warn the Greek government". The breach was also used by the opposition (and the second most popular political party in Greece) Syriza as a form of confrontation.[9]

Again, in April 2020, PGA hacked the Twitter account of Odysseas Konstantinopoulos, a famous Greek politician, former spokesman of PASOK, and vice president of the Greek Parliament tweeting things like: THIS IS THE LAST WARNING GREEK GOVERNMENT.[10][11]

In May 2020, they defaced the Institute of Sociological and Political Legal Research of North Macedonia, and also claimed to have hacked North Macedonia's Ministry of Economy and Ministry of Finance, exposing and posting some of the employees' personal information to the public. According to an official statement by the Government of the Republic of North Macedonia, most of the data that the hackers published was old. They also added they had no evidence at the moment that the e-mail systems were hacked, while the Minister of Economy Kreshnik Bekteshi explained that "no damage has been done" and informed that the ministry's IT department told him that no serious and confidential data was stolen. Some days after the attack, the group's Twitter account was taken down.[12][13][14][15][16][17][18]

In August 2020, PGA took offline some of the biggest banks of Turkey, including, Halkbank, Ziraat Bank, İşbank, DenizBank, Yapı Kredi, and Akbank. They also downed the websites of Turkish Airlines and President of Turkey.[19]

In January 2022, the group hacked into the Twitter account of NASA Director Parimal Kopardekar. The exact reason is unknown, but they claimed that they were looking for someone who works at NASA.[20][21][22]

In February 2022, the group started the operation OpEndMacedonia, which attacked some of the most important computer systems of North Macedonia such as the websites of the Government, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the country's central bank, Makedonski Telekom and news media. The group also hacked the Ministry of Education and Science (North Macedonia), posting their hacked database, and claiming that they "have access even in their camera systems, we watch you 24/7, we have eyes everywhere Skopje". The Ministry confirmed that there was a hacking attack, but said that the camera surveillance system was not theirs. Some weeks after, PGA managed to hit the banking system of North Macedonia, temporarily taking offline all the banks of North Macedonia. National Bank of North Macedonia confirmed the attacks. As an aftermath, North Macedonia signed a Memorandum of understanding agreement with NATO to strengthen their response to cyber attacks.[23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]

References

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  1. ^ Popa, Bogdan (26 November 2016). "Powerful Greek Army Hacker Breaches High Commission Websites in India". Softpedia. Archived from the original on 8 November 2020.
  2. ^ Cimpanu, Catalin. "Hacktivist Group Promises to Take Down Worldwide Media with DDoS Attacks". Softpedia. Archived from the original on 5 September 2019. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  3. ^ "Powerful Greek Army- A Group of Hackers Promises to Take Down Worldwide Media with DDoS Attacks". Latest Hacking News. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  4. ^ "Powerful Greek Army: DDoS στο site του Πρωθυπουργού". SecNews. 4 December 2016. Archived from the original on 28 April 2020.
  5. ^ "Powerful Greek Army: DDoS at the Prime Minister's site". iGuRu. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  6. ^ "Το Πανελλήνιο Σχολικό Δίκτυο SCH.GR δέχτηκε hacking επίθεση από τους Pøwerful Greek Army (Updated)". SecNews. Archived from the original on 24 February 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  7. ^ Μάστορας, Νίκος. "Επίθεση χάκερς στο Πανελλήνιο Σχολικό Δίκτυο; Δηλώνουν ότι άντλησαν προσωπικά δεδομένα μαθητών και εκπαιδευτικών!". alfavita. Archived from the original on 17 January 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  8. ^ "Το Πανελλήνιο Σχολικό Δίκτυο SCH.GR δέχτηκε hacking επίθεση". Greek teachers. Archived from the original on 11 April 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  9. ^ "Απαντήσεις ζητά ο ΣΥΡΙΖΑ για την επίθεση των χάκερς στο Πανελλήνιο Σχολικό Δίκτυο". Avgi. Archived from the original on 7 January 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  10. ^ "Χάκαραν τον λογαριασμό του Οδυσσέα Κωνσταντινόπουλου στο Twitter". Enikos. Archived from the original on 3 January 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  11. ^ "Οδυσσέας Κωνσταντινόπουλος: Θύμα επίθεσης χάκερ έπεσε ο βουλευτής του ΚΙΝΑΛ από την ομάδα Powerful Greek Army". TheCaller. Archived from the original on 7 January 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  12. ^ "Powerful Greek Army го хакираше сајтот на Институтот за социолошки и политичко правни истражувања". opserver.mk. 4 February 2022. Retrieved 4 February 2022.
  13. ^ "The website of #Macedonian Institute for Sociological, Political and Juridical research hacked by so called Powerful Greek Army! One of the benefits from the Prespa Agreement". Twitter.com. Archived from the original on 13 May 2020. Retrieved 15 January 2022.
  14. ^ "Greek hackers claim they broke into Finance and Economy ministries". NetPress. Archived from the original on 4 March 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  15. ^ Stojkovski, Bojan. "Hackers Expose Gaping Holes in North Macedonia's IT Systems". Balkan Insight. Archived from the original on 3 December 2020. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  16. ^ "Greek hackers publish old passwords of employees from Macedonian ministries of Finance and Economy". Meta.mk. Archived from the original on 13 August 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  17. ^ "Грчки хакери го нападнаа министерството за финансии и за економија". Meta.mk. Archived from the original on 14 August 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  18. ^ "Password hack claim puts cyber security on the public agenda in North Macedonia". Global Voices. Archived from the original on 23 December 2021. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  19. ^ "Powerful Greek Army takes down Turkey Government". Onyx Mods LLC. 18 January 2022. Archived from the original on 24 August 2020. Retrieved 18 January 2022.
  20. ^ "NASA Director Twitter account hacked by Powerful Greek in affiliation with Army". Security Affairs. Archived from the original on 4 January 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  21. ^ "'Powerful Greek Army' group hacks twitter account of NASA Director". Greek City Times. Archived from the original on 3 January 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2022.
  22. ^ "Greek hackers hacked NASA chief social account". Blackweb-security.org. 4 January 2022. Retrieved 15 January 2022.
  23. ^ "Έλληνες χάκερ επιτίθενται στην ιστοσελίδα της Εθνικής Τράπεζας: Θα διαγράψουμε τον Σ. Η Μακεδονία από το Διαδίκτυο - Ελεύθερος Τύπος". 8 February 2022.
  24. ^ "Накусо отежнат пристапот до веб-страниците на НБ и на домашните банки: Интегритетот и доверливоста на податоците не се доведени во прашање".
  25. ^ "Βόρεια Μακεδονία: Νέα επίθεση Ελλήνων χάκερ έριξε το τραπεζικό σύστημα". 23 February 2022.
  26. ^ "Έλληνες χάκερ "έριξαν" το τραπεζικό σύστημα των Σκοπίων!". 23 February 2022.
  27. ^ https://kapital.mk/%D0%B3%D1%80%D1%87%D0%BA%D0%B8-%D1%85%D0%B0%D0%BA%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B8-%D0%B3%D0%B8-%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%BF%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%B0-%D0%B2%D0%B5%D0%B1-%D1%81%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B8%D1%86%D0%B8/
  28. ^ "NBRM: There was a hacker attack on the websites of domestic banks, the confidentiality of the data remains unharmed". 23 February 2022.
  29. ^ "National Bank: There was a brief attack on the banks' websites, there is no danger for the data - Free Press". 23 February 2022.
  30. ^ "North Macedonia's banks taken down by Greek hacking group". 24 February 2022.
  31. ^ "North Macedonia and NATO strengthen the response to cyber attacks – signed Memorandum of Understanding".
  32. ^ "Покрај владини институции ,,грчките" хакери нападнале и еден македонски медиум (ФОТО)". 7 February 2022.
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