A significant cyber attack occurred at Canada’s Foreign Affairs Department last week, on the same day the government warned of Russian-backed cyber threats.

Some services were still down, the government officials said on Monday but not discussed who was responsible.

According to Canada's National Post, the attacks continued to cause disruptions to a host of departmental systems on Monday and would take “days” to address.

Critical services are currently functioning. Some access to internet and internet-based services are currently not working, said author of the statement from the Treasury Board, which has overall responsibility for government operations.

There is no indication that any other government departments have been impacted, it said, adding no more details would be released.

Federal government detected cyber incident last Wednesday,  on Jan. 19. 2022. A day earlier,  Canada’s signals intelligence agency said network operators of critical infrastructure should boost their defenses against Russian state-sponsored threats.

The U.S. government in the same week warned of Russian-backed hackers trying to attack government organizations.


Canada at forefront of the world’s efforts to dissuade Russia from invading Ukraine

Russian state-sponsored advanced persistent threat actors have used sophisticated cyber capabilities to target a variety of U.S. and international critical infrastructure organizations, including those in the Defense Industrial Base as well as the Healthcare and Public Health, Energy, Telecommunications, and Government Facilities Sectors, the federal government warned.

Canada Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly has taken a strong line against Russia’s military build-up at the Ukraine's border over the last few weeks.

The minister returned on Saturday from a nearly week-long trip to Europe during which she met with Ukrainian, European and NATO officials to discuss Russia’s increasingly threatening presence along its shared border with Ukraine.