Rt Hon Winston Peters

New Zealand First Leader

Member of Parliament for Northland
28 JUNE 2017

Cyberattack Raises More Questions Over Unsupported Windows Server 2003 in Governement

The latest “Petya” cyberattack has New Zealand First wanting the government to front over how widespread unsupported Windows Server 2003 is within the public service.

“The latest “Petya” cyberattack is so bad, nuclear monitoring systems at Chernobyl in Ukraine have been broken and it has seen the GCSB issue warnings here,” says New Zealand First Leader and Northland MP Rt Hon Winston Peters.

“Following close on the heels of last month’s ‘WannaCry’ Ransomware attack, NZ First wanted reassurance about New Zealand’s vulnerability. Well we didn’t get it.

“On 15 May, we asked each Minister to check within their portfolio for how much government computing hinged on Windows Server 2003. This is key because Microsoft ended its ‘extended support’ for this backend software just under two years ago.

“All Ministers transferred the question to the Minister responsible for the GCSB Chris Finlayson, who gave us this stock answer:

“I understand this question was submitted in relation to every Ministerial portfolio. I am responding on behalf of Ministers who received this question. I am advised that publishing the information the Member has requested in the public domain increases the risk that actors may use the information to target government information systems. It is therefore not in the public interest to provide this information”.

“How do you like that? See an Ostrich anyone?” says Mr Peters.

ENDS

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