Angola's central bank tames latest data breach
There is no indication who executed the attack or how much was lost in the process
The apex of Angola (Banco Nacional de Angola) suffered a cyberattack on its systems on January 6th, 2024.
Revealing the incident in a fresh statement, the Bank says that the breach was however mitigated by its cybersecurity setups, with no significant impact on its basic infrastructure and data.
"Following the incident, controlled access to the technological infrastructure was ensured, thus enabling the secure and efficient provision of institutional services," the statement reads, without identifying perpetrators or indicating financial losses possibly incurred.
"It is important to emphasize that the information systems security management strategy of the National Bank of Angola is guided by processes that allow the categorization of such incidents according to internationally accepted standards, principles, and guidelines, the Bank says.
The Angolan financial system has frenetically developed in the past decades in the wake of an oil boom that followed the Southern African country's civil war in 2002.
Banco Nacional de Angola manages billions of dollars in assets for the lower-middle-income nation's financial institutions, serving a populace of over 33 million.
Speaking at a cybersecurity forum held in Luanda in May 2023, the Bank's governor, José de Lima Massano, said BNA "registers about 350 cyber attacks daily". Massano also stressed that the systems have "managed to remain resilient".
BNA joins the count of African government-owned financial institutions that have been cyber-attacked in the past year, including the central banks of Lesotho, South Sudan, Zambia, and South Africa.
More recently, Kenya Airways (KQ) and Kenya's Airports Authority (KAA) were hacked.
