Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda said the theft of over 600,000 records from the Centre of Registers is a matter of national security, adding that “hostile states” were likely responsible for the incident.
“Today, we can probably confirm that this was the work of hostile states. There are signs that this was a cyber attack organised by hostile states,” Nausėda said on Wednesday following a meeting of the State Defence Council.
“I believe this is a national security issue; what happened is intolerable and must not be repeated in the future,” he added.
Nausėda also criticised the decision to delay announcing the incident, despite the government knowing about it a month prior.
“It is truly unjustifiable that the public was informed with a delay of one or two months,” the head of state said following a State Defence Council meeting on Wednesday. “One cannot hide behind any restrictions from the Prosecutor General’s Office.”
“This should have been done because there is no prohibition from the Prosecutor General’s Office to publish this information. This information would have allowed our people to make appropriate decisions and reduce the level of threat they faced,” Nausėda said.
Nausėda added that his own personal data was among that accessed by hackers during the incident in March.
Asked whether Prime Minister Inga Ruginienė should resign over the situation, the head of state did not give a direct answer, but pointed to the government crisis in Latvia.
“It is not difficult to cause a new crisis, but I have more confidence in people’s determination to overcome this crisis through concrete actions,” Nauseda said.
Further reading
The president emphasised that before anyone assumes political responsibility for the scandal, all circumstances must be assessed and the culprits identified.
He said Migration Department accounts were hacked, but noted other systemic weaknesses that must be addressed. According to him, while this indicates activity by hostile states, it does not exempt institutions from responsibility.
According to the head of state, there is currently no evidence that the stolen information has been directly used to cause financial loss to individuals, though the risk of fraud remains.
“The lesson is that many of our institutions are still vulnerable; their security level is insufficient. They are informed that the security level is inadequate and they must take immediate decisions to increase it,” Nauseda said.
He also criticised the fact that he was not informed about the incident in a timely manner, stressing that this is a national security issue rather than a local one.
The Prosecutor General’s Office is investigating the leak of more than 600,000 real estate register records, including personal identification codes, accessed via hacked Migration Department accounts.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
