Encrypted messaging service Telegram was targeted by a major cyberattack that originated from China, CEO Pavel Durov said yesterday, linking it to ongoing political unrest in Hong Kong, as protesters planned another demonstration for Sunday.
Many protesters in the territory have used Telegram to evade surveillance and coordinate their demonstrations against a bill that would allow extraditions to China.
Telegram on Wednesday announced that it was suffering a “powerful” distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack, which involves a hacker overwhelming a target’s servers by making a massive number of junk requests.
Photo: AFP
Users in many regions might face connection issues, it said.
Durov said that the junk requests came mostly from China.
“Historically, all state actor-sized DDoS (200-400 Gb/s of junk) we experienced coincided in time with protests in Hong Kong,” he tweeted.
Telegram later announced that its service had stabilized. It also posted a series of tweets explaining the nature of the attack.
“Imagine that an army of lemmings just jumped the queue at McDonald’s in front of you — and each is ordering a whopper,” it said. “The server is busy telling the whopper lemmings they came to the wrong place — but there are so many of them that the server can’t even see you to try and take your order.”
Meanwhile, Hong Kong protest leaders announced plans for another rally on Sunday.
Sporadic demonstrations broke out again yesterday, with occasional scuffles with police, but crowds were much smaller and there was no repeat of the running battles of the day before.
The government attempted to reduce tensions by indefinitely postponing a legislative debate on the bill.
However, demonstrators have vowed to not let up, calling for a rally on Sunday and a territory-wide strike on Monday next week.
The police response has drawn criticism from a range of influential bodies, with calls for an independent inquiry into “excessive force” from a top legal body that helps elect the territory’s leader.
The Hong Kong Bar Association also said that the police “may well have overstepped its lawful powers” with “wholly unnecessary force against largely unarmed protesters who did not appear to pose any immediate threat to the police or the public.”
Beijing said that it fully supports the authorities’ handling of the protests.
“What happened in the Admiralty area was not a peaceful rally, but a riot organized by a group,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Geng Shuang (耿爽) told reporters.
In a televised speech on Wednesday evening, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥) denounced the demonstration as “blatant, organized riots.”
“[Such behavior] will not be tolerated in any civilizations or societies governed by the rule of law,” she said.
The international community has also voiced concern.
The EU called for the “fundamental right” of Hong Kongers to assemble and express themselves to be respected, adding that the bill has “potentially far-reaching consequences for Hong Kong and its people, for EU and foreign citizens, as well as for business confidence in Hong Kong.”
British Prime Minister Theresa May said that it is vital that the bill does not breach the Sino-British Joint Declaration signed in 1984.
Additional reporting by CNA
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS