MP's website hit with suspected cyber attack 'traceable to China'

A former cabinet minister’s website has been taken offline temporarily after a suspected cyber attack.

Sir David Davis warned the attack was “a direct interference with a Member of Parliament carrying out his duties”, as he told the Commons his website “was hit with 142 million requests, consuming nearly 800 gigabytes (GB) of data”.

The Goole and Pocklington MP alleged much of the traffic was “traceable to China”.

Man found dead in North Yorkshire - of kin sought

Bank holiday rail disruption ahead as major work takes place around York

People 'too scared' to come forward after car shooting in York, police say

Attacks on Sir David’s website are thought to have begun last Thursday morning, when a series of tab-style links, supposed to contain information the Conservative MP, directed users instead to gambling pages.

“This is not a minor nuisance, it’s a direct interference with a Member of Parliament carrying out his duties.” (Image: UK Parliament)

On Monday evening, the website daviddavismp.com displayed the message: “Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance.

“Check back in a minute.”

Describing the attack, the former Brexit secretary said: “Last Thursday, my Ipsa (Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority) provided website was compromised.

“Malicious links were inserted, redirecting users to south-east Asian gambling websites – I guess it could be worse.

“We took it down immediately.

“It was restored but then came under sustained distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack, traceable to China.

“In just 24 hours, the site was hit with 142 million requests, consuming nearly 800GB of data.

“This is not a minor nuisance, it’s a direct interference with a Member of Parliament carrying out his duties.”

A DDoS attack involves the attacker flooding a server or website with internet traffic originating from more than one source.

The Press Association understood that while the majority of traffic appeared to come from China, Sir David’s office has identified a small number of hits from other countries and is working with website hosts to find a way to prevent further attacks.

Deputy speaker Nus Ghani told MPs: “I do not think it would be appropriate to the details publicly preventative action and how members are supported to protect themselves against these kinds of cyber threats.

“If members would like security advice on how to make personal accounts and devices more resilient, they should PSD (Parliamentary Security Department).

“For matters related to parliamentary accounts and equipment, members should PDS (Parliamentary Digital Service) through the PDS service desk.”