The royal family’s website is primarily a repository of information about the working members of the family, but it is also a place where news is released, as well as an important piece of infrastructure that keeps the palace running, which makes it an attractive target for mischief. Hours after a denial-of-service (DoS) attack on the website Sunday, a group of pro-Russia hackers called KillNet claimed responsibility, but their participation hasn’t been confirmed.
At about 10 a.m. local time, royal.uk was inaccessible for approximately 90 minutes. During the outage, a royal source told The Mirror that no sensitive information had been compromised. “The website is down due to a denial-of-service attack,” the source explained. “Denial-of-service attacks see sites bombarded with traffic, as opposed to hacking, which sees people actually gain access to a site. There has been no access to the royal household systems or content. It is impossible to say at this stage who is responsible.”
The Daily Mail reports that KillNet attempted to attack the royal website in November 2022, which also resulted in an outage. KillNet first came to prominence after threatening and claiming responsibility for a series of attacks on health care organizations in the United Kingdom and the United States as retaliation against nations who have backed Ukraine in its conflict with Russia.
The royal family has been open about their support for Ukraine since the early days of the conflict in February 2022. During an address to France’s Senate last week, King Charles III praised the country for joining the UK in allying with Ukraine and Ukrainian people. “Our alliance and our resolve are as important as ever,” he said. “Together, we stand in resolute solidarity with the Ukrainian people. Together, we are steadfast in our determination Ukraine will triumph, and that our cherished freedoms will prevail.”
More than a decade ago, royal.uk was the victim of another suspected DoS attack attempt. In April 2011, a hacker allegedly encouraged others to attack the site while it was streaming the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. Six months later, a spokesperson for Scotland Yard said a 16-year-old had been detained and questioned in connection with the attack.
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