Metro Center: 2024 Cyberattacks Targeted PUKMEDIA, 5 Other Media Outlets

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Demonstration of a hacker targeting PUKMEDIA.

The Metro Center for Journalists' Rights & Advocacy announced their 2024 statistics on violations against journalists and the media, indicating that PUKMEDIA and several other media outlets were targeted in cyberattacks in 2024. The Center's Director says that cyberattacks and violence are both dangerous and have the same goal.

Director of the Metro Center Diyari Mohammed told PUKMEDIA that six cyberattacks on media outlets, including PUKMEDIA, occurred in 2024, indicating that these attacks aim to impede the agency's ability to reach readers and viewers.

"Therefore, cyberattacks and violence are both dangerous and have the same purpose of keeping information from reaching the public,” said Mohammed.

During the campaign for the sixth term of the Kurdistan parliamentary elections last year, a cyberattack targeted PUKMEDIA, the official website of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), causing it to be temporarily disabled, raising concerns that the attack's goal was to prevent the public from obtaining the PUK's views.

According to the Metro Center, 182 violations against journalists were documented last year, three journalists were killed in drone attacks, 103 journalists were prevented from news coverage, and six cyberattacks were launched against various media outlets.



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