The Binary Guardians defaced the CNE’s website and took over its Twitter account following the Venezuelan Constituent Assembly election (July 2017)
On July 31, 2017, in the early hours following the July 30 election for the National Constituent Assembly, the hacktivist group The Binary Guardians defaced the website of Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) (www.cne.gov.ve), which remained inaccessible for several hours, displaying the word “hacked,” the group’s account, and messages denouncing alleged electoral fraud (“What do you think—that we don’t know you committed fraud?”, “Venezuela is going to burn,” “Our fight is digital. You block the streets, and we’ll block the networks”). The group also took control of the CNE’s Twitter account, from which—according to reports—it posted that the approximately 8 million reported votes were “a complete lie” and “total fraud,” claiming that the actual number of votes did not exceed 2 million. CNE President Tibisay Lucena confirmed the attack by “criminal groups” and that service had been restored. The same campaign affected other government websites (VTV, the Presidency, among others) and intensified in August 2017.
Impact details
The CNE’s website was the target of an attack that altered its content or rendered it inaccessible, and its official Twitter account was hijacked to post messages about election fraud following the Constituent Assembly elections. No data breaches were reported.
Classification & severity
- Category
- Information content security
- Subtype
- website defacement and social media account takeover
- Confidence
- High
Several sources document the defacement or disruption of the CNE website and the takeover of its official Twitter account by The Binary Guardians.
Severity assessment
High- Functional impact
- Degraded (critical)
- Information impact
- Integrity loss
- Affected scope
- Multiple systems
- Critical service
- Degraded
- Public confidence
- Significant
- Recoverability
- Supplemented
The impact on the integrity and availability of the electoral authority’s website and its official social media channel has been confirmed during a highly significant election period.
Timeline
The election for the National Constituent Assembly is held; the CNE reports approximately 8.1 million votes (41.5% turnout), a figure disputed by the opposition.
In the early morning, The Binary Guardians defaced the CNE website (www.cne.gov.ve), rendering it inaccessible and displaying the word “hacked” along with messages against fraud. Other government websites (VTV, the Presidency, etc.) were also attacked.
The group claimed responsibility for the attack via its Twitter account (@TBGuardians, created in July 2017) and took control of the CNE’s Twitter account, posting that the 8 million votes were “a complete lie” and “a total fraud.”
CNE President Tibisay Lucena confirms the attack by "criminal groups" and announces that service has been restored.
The group states that there will be more attacks; the campaign against Venezuelan government websites continues and intensifies in August 2017.