New Zealand stock exchange hit by cyber-attack

NZX said it had first been hit by a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack from abroad, according to BBC. The exchange said the attack had ‘impacted NZX network connectivity’ and it had decided to halt trading in cash markets just before 16:00 local time, on August 25, 2020.

Trading stopped briefly for a second time, on August 26, 2020, but was back up and running before the end of the day. A DDoS attack is a type of cyber-attack, in which a large array of computers all try to connect to an online service at once, overwhelming its capacity. They often use devices compromised by malware the owners do not know are part of the attack.

Even though genuine traders may have had problems carrying out their business, it does not mean any financial or personal information was accessed.

NZX said the attack had come ‘from offshore via its network service provider’.