Question : Hacking of Website

(a) whether the website of the ISRO''s commercial arm Antrix corporation was hacked recently and if so, the details thereof;

(b) whether the hosting of the said website was outsourced;

(c) if so, the details thereof;

(d) whether the host who created the website was vetted by the National Informatics Centre and if so, the details thereof; and

(e) whether any sensitive information relating to the space and defence programme or that of the DRDO has been leaked and if so, the details thereof and the steps taken by the Government to avoid recurrence of such incident?

THE MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF PERSONNEL, PG & PENSIONS AND IN THE PRIME MINISTER’S OFFICE
(DR. JITENDRA SINGH):

(a) No Madam. On 12th July 2015, the server which hosted the website of the ISRO’s commercial arm Antrix Corporation Limited (Antrix) was compromised due to a faulty configuration. This had lead to defacing of one page (viz., the ‘Home Page’) of Antrix website. On investigation, this appeared to be the work of a malicious code and not manual hacking.

(b) Yes Madam.

(c) The Antrix website, from 2009 onwards, till recent, was hosted on the server of a reputed service provider in Bangalore, who is in the business of providing web-hosting and related services to Government as well as private users.

(d) No Madam.

(e) No Madam. No sensitive information relating to the space and defence programme or that of the DRDO has been lost or leaked; as no such information was hosted on the Antrix website. The Antrix website, from 13th July 2015 onwards, after duly rectifying the defaced Home Page, is hosted on the server owned by ISRO in a more secured environment.

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