Kenyan Gov't Restores ECitizen Portal After Cybersecurity Attack: "Services Have Resumed"

• The eCitizen platform that offers over 5,000 government services, suffered cyber security attacks, making it inaccessible
• Kenyans on social media raised concerns over system delays and service breakdowns one month after the government onboarded the new services
• The Ministry of Interior and National Coordination revealed the attempted cyberattack overwhelmed the system

The Ministry of Interior and National Coordination has confirmed that normal services on the eCitizen platform have resumed after a cybersecurity breach.

In a statement, the ministry said Kenyans can now access over 5,000 services offered on the platform.

"We wish to notify the general public that services through the e-Citizen platform (ecitizen.go.ke) have resumed following a regrettable downtime since Sunday, July 23, 2023," the ministry stated as reported by Citizen Digital.

Capital FM reported that the government explained that an attempted cyberattack overwhelmed the system and rendered it inaccessible to users.

"It involved flooding the target system with massive traffic from multiple sources simultaneously," the Interior Ministry revealed.

Eliud Owalo says no data accessed

ICT Cabinet Secretary Eliud Owalo assured that no data was accessed, reiterating that the government will continue its digital plan despite such risks.

"That is not strange to me because the cyber attack is predominant worldwide. We cannot stop digitising our records and services because we are risk averse," said Owalo during an interview with a local radio station, Spice FM, on Thursday, July 27.

Owalo noted that the government was setting up an elaborate risk mitigation framework to deal with the attack and related risks in the future.

He said this will lead to sustainable digitalisation, part of President William Ruto's key government agenda.

Anonymous Sudan claims responsibility

Besides eCitizen, Kenya Power and Lighting Company, Kenya Railways, Safaricom, Absa Bank, Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) and Standard Chartered Bank were hacked.

Anonymous Sudan, a pro-Russian hacktivist, claimed responsibility and warned Kenyans to brace for more disruption of services.

"Most Kenyan websites will encounter problems. We cannot reveal the details of the attack, but we are certain this attack has harmed their infrastructure a lot, and they know this very well," the hacker tweeted.