Cyber Incident Victim: City of DuBois
Date:
Aug 2014
Location:
United States of America
Summary
The City of DuBois, Pennsylvania, experienced a website defacement by a Moroccan hacker using the alias 'MaeSTro-GhoL,' who claimed the attack as a political protest against U.S. support for Israel during the Gaza conflict. The compromised site displayed a message declaring "PalesTine is Free" alongside protest hashtags and a YouTube video, rendering municipal services inaccessible. The hacker explicitly cited opposition to Israeli military operations and U.S. funding as motivations, aligning the incident with broader hacktivist campaigns targeting U.S. government websites during that period. Operational disruption was limited to the temporary replacement of the site's content with the defacement page.
| CIA Posture | Motives | Tactics, Techniques & Procedures |
|---|---|---|
| Available to members | 1 motive | 1 technique |
| Threat Actor | Type | Location |
|---|---|---|
| 1 actor | Available to members | Available to members |
Description
On August 28, 2014, the official website of the City of DuBois, Pennsylvania (duboispa.gov), was compromised by a Moroccan hacker using the alias "MaeSTro-GhoL." The attacker replaced the site's content with a defacement page containing the message "PalesTine is Free" and a YouTube video expressing solidarity with Gaza. The defacement included the statement: "We Don’t Want Your Website .. We Want To Share This Message 'PalesTine is Free' !Hacked By MaeSTro-GhoL. Free PaleStine." The hacker claimed the attack was conducted under the hashtags #GazaUnderAttack, #PrayForGaza, #AJAGAZA, and #ICC4Israel. In communications with the article's author, the hacker explicitly stated the intrusion protested U.S. financial support for Israel during its military operations in Gaza, specifically referencing Operation Protective Edge. The compromised page remained publicly visible at the time of the article's publication, with mirrors of the defaced content archived on Zone-H (ID 22830850).
The website disruption occurred during a wave of similar incidents targeting U.S. municipal platforms, including a recent compromise of Binghamton, New York's official site by Anonymous-affiliated actors. No technical details regarding the attack vector or duration of downtime were disclosed in available sources. The defacement exclusively affected the front-facing web presence (duboispa.gov/x.html), with no evidence of data exfiltration or secondary system compromises. Publicly available information does not document containment measures, forensic investigations, or restoration timelines undertaken by City of DuBois officials. The incident highlighted geopolitical motivations in cyber operations against local government infrastructure, with attackers leveraging municipal websites as low-risk platforms for ideological messaging rather than seeking financial gain or persistent access.