The Norwegian Parliament (Stortinget) said on Tuesday that it fell victim to a cyber-attack that targeted its internal email system

Norway's Parliament, Stortinget, says hackers gained access and downloaded content for "a small number of parliamentary representatives and employees."

Image: terimakasih0

The Norwegian Parliament (Stortinget) said on Tuesday that it fell victim to a cyber-attack that targeted its internal email system.

In a handout today, Stortinget director Marianne Andreassen said that hackers breached email accounts for elected representatives and employees alike, from where they stole various amounts of data.

Andreassen said the incident is currently under investigation, and, as a result, couldn't provide any insight into who was behind the attack, or the amount of hacked accounts.

Norway's intelligence is currently investigating the incident, consistent with a press release the agency posted on its Twitter account earlier today.

PST er kjent med IT-angrepet mot Stortinget. Når PST har mottatt anmeldelsen vil vi vurdere om det er grunnlag for å starte etterforskning. https://t.co/UIuqeXgaea

— PST (@PSTnorge) September 1, 2020

While the investigation remains ongoing, Andreassen said that Stortinget has already started notifying impacted representatives and employees about the incident.

Local press, who first broke the story about the attacks, also reported that the parliament's IT staff has packed up its email service to stop the hackers from siphoning more data.

Before today's incident, cyber-attacks targeting Norway are rare and much apart.

In January 2018, a hacker group stole healthcare data for quite half of Norway's population, consistent with local press.

In February 2019, cyber-security firms Rapid7 and Recorded Future revealed that Chinese hackers breached Visma, a Norwegian company that gives cloud-based business software solutions for European companies, and used this access to attack the company's customers.

In May 2020, a gaggle of internet scammers tricked Norfund, Norway's state investment fund, out of $10 million, in an attack referred to as a business email compromise.