Hackers deface Portugal's ASAE website with José Sócrates image, site taken offline

What the attack did

The official website of the Food Safety and Economic Authority (ASAE) was defaced in the early hours of Sunday, 15 November. The home page was swapped for a retro-style illustration showing a figure that Rádio Renascença first reported resembled former Portuguese prime minister José Sócrates, signed 'Hacked by José Sócrates'. Beneath it ran a protest line: 'Too many laws for those who have nothing, too much freedom for those who steal millions.' Observador's archived capture shows the image layered with an animation and background music. Defacement means gaining unauthorised access to a web server and replacing the visible front page with the attacker's own message, which is what appears to have happened here.

By lunchtime on Sunday the site had gone offline, and it was still unavailable at 19:50 Lisbon time. Attempts to reach the official address failed for as long as the outage lasted.

Official response and open questions

An official ASAE source confirmed the attack to Observador. The newspaper sent the authority questions about the mitigation steps it had taken, but no reply had arrived by the time of writing. Observador also contacted the National Cybersecurity Centre (CNCS) to learn whether any notification had been made, a question that remained open at the time of writing. Nobody has said who carried out the intrusion. No confirmation has been given that internal data or systems were compromised, and the attack so far appears to have touched only the look of the page. The authority is investigating while it works to restore normal operation of the portal.

Earlier attacks on Portuguese institutions

Observador reports that the website of the Institute for Housing and Urban Rehabilitation (IHRU) was hit by a similar defacement earlier in November, when its pictures were replaced with images from housing protests. Notícias ao Minuto lists further targets. Sintra's municipal water and sanitation services (SMAS de Sintra) said on Thursday, 12 November, that an attack had exposed some customer data and that containment measures were in place. The day before, on Wednesday, 11 November, the retailer Worten confirmed an attack of the same kind that gave access to customer and service-provider data, and said it had fixed the vulnerability that was exploited.

Defence minister's phone hacked

Notícias ao Minuto also reports that the mobile phone of Defence Minister Nuno Melo was hacked. The intrusion let third parties use his number to send messages in his name and divert his communications. Melo was asked about the incident during the debate on the 2027 State Budget in the Assembleia da República, and he responded with the following words.

“Nobody is immune to this type of intrusion.”

No source links the ASAE defacement, the housing ministry site, the utility breach, the retail breach or the minister's phone to a single actor.