SEOUL: South Korea’s Overseas Ministry mentioned on Tuesday (Jul 21) a “vital” quantity of knowledge appeared to have been uncovered in a cyberattack on a government-run diplomatic academy, as authorities look at potential involvement by overseas state-backed hacking teams.
Ministry spokesperson Park Il instructed a briefing that findings to date prompt an information leak of “appreciable scale”, though authorities had but to find out the total extent of the breach or the precise data affected.
He mentioned no misuse of leaked information had been confirmed and there was inadequate technical proof to find out who was behind the assault, though the federal government was not ruling out any prospects, together with foreign-based hacking teams.
The feedback adopted a ministry assertion issued on Monday disclosing that unidentified attackers exploited a beforehand unknown “zero-day” software program vulnerability and safety configuration weaknesses to compromise the Korea Nationwide Diplomatic Academy’s on-line schooling system.
The ministry mentioned the attackers gained management of a server between April and Could 2025 and maintained entry till February 2026, when suspicious exercise was reported by a authorities company and the system was blocked.
The assertion mentioned the system saved coaching movies and data wanted for course administration, together with individuals’ names and person IDs, however added that it remained troublesome to find out what information had been leaked.
South Korean every day Dong-A Ilbo, citing authorities sources, reported that non-public data belonging to about 6,000 present and former diplomats and officers seconded from different ministries might have been compromised.
The report mentioned intelligence authorities have been investigating whether or not a North Korean-linked hacking group might have focused the info, which incorporates data on diplomats stationed abroad.
Park mentioned the ministry was working intently with related companies to determine the total extent of the breach and strengthen inside cybersecurity methods.
