Audio: Minister Roban On Cyber-Attack

At approximately 10:00pm on Wednesday [Sept 20] the “Government IT systems experienced a serious cyber-attack,” officials are working hard to resolve the issue, the international business community and the banks have reached out to offer support, and the “Government has ongoing contact with Government House and we are grateful for support from the UK National Cybersecurity Center and National Security Agency.”

This was from Deputy Premier Walter Roban, who said “the assistance offered has come from across the spectrum” the “priority is to return to normal operations as soon as possible” and “this is a very delicate situation.”

Speaking in Parliament today the Minister said, “Over recent days we’ve had a serious IT disruption within Government, of considerable impact, and I just wanted to take the time on behalf of the Government to report to the House and the country to the situation, as it has impacted our own operations as a legislature and obviously other important branches of Government, it is important that the Government and myself speak to these matters.

“At approximately 10:00pm on Wednesday, September 20th, the Government IT systems experienced a serious cyber-attack which resulted in a disruption of services across Government departments.

“An immediate investigation has commenced and did commence at that time by the Department of Information and Digital Technologies, and the matter was reported to the Bermuda Police Service who also commenced an investigation.

“The cybersecurity committee was convened to review this matter. The Cabinet and the Government…leading members of the Government and Government House were apprised of the situation and the Government departments commenced work on systems containment and took immediate action to mitigate any further impact on services. We all know that most of the services of Government were severely impacted on Wednesday and yesterday and the appropriate action was taken to deal with that.

“I am confident and the Government is confident in our ability to continue the delivery of services to the community… but we anticipate that our contingency plans to deliver services may result in some delays. More details on specific service delivery impacts will be provided later today and through the weekend.

“I can assure members of this House, this is a 24 hour issue for us. Members of the Cabinet have been meeting daily on this, members of the cybersecurity meeting has been meeting on this with other relevant local and international parties to deal with the situation.

“The Government has ongoing contact with Government House and we are grateful for support from the UK National Cybersecurity Center and National Security Agency.

“It is recognized that this regrettable incident will cause concern to many in our community, and we will continue to regularly update the public as more information comes available. This is a moving situation, I do not want people to underestimate some of the sensitive security issues and even international issues that are around this matter because of the gravity of the incident.

“In the hours since the event occurred, many have endured sleepless nights. The very heart of public services has been attacked and immobilized. Usually the term resilience is used to describe how we as a community respond to the recovery of a hurricane. Make no mistake, we will recover from this. The resilience that we know our country to have is working in our favour right now.

“Already, we have unity and purpose joining the public and private sectors to derive solutions to problems that would otherwise impact economic activity and our people’s ability to meet their commitments.

“And I can assure members of the House that members of the international business community have reached out to the Government and are providing support and assistance to us, as are our local banks, to assist the Government with making sure that certain obligations that the Government has over the upcoming days and weeks will be met.

“The assistance offered has come from across the spectrum and is actually quite heartening to know that this challenging moment we can count on the assistance of key partners, both local and international.

“Our priority is to return to normal operations as soon as possible,” the Minister added.

“There are still questions that we are seeking to get answers to ourselves. I would remind people this is a very delicate situation, there are international implications around some of the issues that have arisen as a result of this, which is why we’re working with Government House and the United Kingdom, and we appreciate the support that we’re getting from the United Kingdom and other sectors, our own international business community, and others who we have retained to support dealing with this situation.

“We will continue to provide regular reports to the community, and we will ensure that everybody is kept up to date on all steps we are taking with the situation to ensure that government services return to normal operation.”

Note: The above is a manual transcription of some of the comments and should be taken as such. It does not contain every single sentence the Minister stated, and to ensure you receive the full statement please listen to the audio version.

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