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Threat Intelligence & APT The Record 1 month ago

International Meteor Organization says cyberattack dealt ‘critical blow’ to website

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CyberNew Threat Research Desk
• Original Reporting: The Record
CyberNew Threat Intel Assessment
Assessed Severity: CRITICAL
Impacted Surface
Enterprise Perimeter & Network Defense
Intelligence Sector
Threat Intelligence & APT

Analyst Takeaway

"The Geminid Meteor Shower over the Fred C. Babcock/Cecil M. Webb Wildlife Management Area in Flordia in 2020. Image: Diana Robinson via Flickr / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 International Meteor Organization says cyberattack dealt ‘critical blow’ to website A cyberattack has shut down the website of the premier international organization responsible for tracking meteors. The International Meteor Organization..."

Recommended Defense & Mitigation

  • Emergency Patching: Prioritize vendor patches and CVE mitigation across internet-facing assets immediately.
  • Perimeter Audit: Inspect perimeter firewall logs and hunt for unauthorized RCE indicators.
Curated & Verified by CyberNew Threat Intelligence Desk Standard Defense Framework (NIST / MITRE ATT&CK)
meteor shower
The Geminid Meteor Shower over the Fred C. Babcock/Cecil M. Webb Wildlife Management Area in Flordia in 2020. Image: Diana Robinson via Flickr / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

International Meteor Organization says cyberattack dealt ‘critical blow’ to website

A cyberattack has shut down the website of the premier international organization responsible for tracking meteors. 

The International Meteor Organization (IMO) has continued tracking asteroids and meteor through its Facebook page, but its website now carries a static page notifying visitors of the cyberattack. 

“We recently suffered a cyberattack that dealt a critical blow to aging infrastructure, taking much of our site offline,” the organization said. “We expect several weeks of partial downtime as we transition to new infrastructure and services. We will bring features back as they become available.”

The IMO said it prioritized restoring its fireball reporting system, which is now available to users for submissions. 

The nongovernmental organization did not respond to requests for comment. It was founded in 1988 as a way to unite amateur and professional meteor observers and scientists. 

Source Verification & Original Intelligence

This threat report was reviewed by CyberNew analysts and cross-referenced with primary security disclosures from The Record.

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