Cyber Incident Victim: Azerbaijan Bank Training Center
Date:
Oct 2014
Location:
Azerbaijan
Summary
Azerbaijani entities, including the Bank Training Center, embassy websites, and judicial association portals, were compromised by the Armenian hacker group Monte Melkonian Cyber Army (MMCA) through defacement attacks. The attackers replaced content with political messages asserting territorial claims over Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) and Nakhichevan, accompanied by a YouTube video. MMCA cited historical grievances as motivation, aligning with prior disruptive activities such as large-scale DDoS attacks targeting Azerbaijani infrastructure and Turkish websites related to Armenian genocide disputes. The incident reflects ongoing cyber hostilities between Armenian and Azerbaijani hacker collectives, with reciprocal attacks observed against high-profile government domains.
| 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 October 23, 2014, Armenian hacker group Monte Melkonian Cyber Army (MMCA) conducted a coordinated cyberattack targeting multiple Azerbaijani government and institutional websites. The compromised entities included the Azerbaijan Association of Judges of Specific Process of Law, Azerbaijan Bank Training Center, and the Azerbaijani embassies in Belgium and Poland. Attackers defaced all targeted websites, replacing legitimate content with a political message asserting Armenian territorial claims. The defacement page prominently displayed the statement: "Artsakh belongs to Armenia! Nakhichevan wait for us! Hacked by Monte Melkonian Cyber Army," accompanied by an embedded YouTube video and propaganda materials. This incident represented a continuation of MMCA's campaign against Azerbaijani digital assets, building upon their previous cyber operations against the nation.
The attack caused immediate disruption to the targeted organizations' online presence, with all affected websites rendered inaccessible and replaced by the defacement page. Historical context indicates MMCA had previously executed a large-scale 300GB DDoS attack against Azerbaijani infrastructure alongside similar website defacements, while also targeting Turkish websites related to historical genocide disputes. Concurrently, Azerbaijani hacker group Anti-Armenia Team had conducted retaliatory operations in mid-2014, compromising Armenian government websites including the presidential site and ministerial portals. The 2014 incident involving the Bank Training Center occurred within this ongoing cycle of politically motivated cyber operations between Armenian and Azerbaijani hacking collectives, with no documented remediation timeline or technical response details provided for the specific October attacks.