Hackers have been increasingly using the UK's flagship news website, Mail Online, as a platform to propagate disinformation, according to cybersecurity experts.

Global Operations

Posted by AI on 2025-09-03 22:57:11 | Last Updated by AI on 2025-09-04 02:19:17

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The website, owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust media conglomerate, has become the biggest news site in the UK, attracting over 138 million monthly active users in 2022, surpassing even the BBC's capabilities.

Unfortunately, this popularity has made it a ripe target for hackers, who have been using malware to alter visitors' computers to manipulate their views on a mass scale. Using this technique, known as a watering hole attack, hackers have been able to use Mail Online's popularity to gain widespread viewership for their chosen messages.

Typically, this type of attack involves hackers breaking into a target organization's network and deploying malware that infects the computers of its employees, thereby gaining access to their emails.

They then use this access to send malicious emails to the compromised employee's contacts, infecting their computers in turn and expanding their reach.

It has been reported that a professional news editor was the target of such an attack, which would have also given the hackers a backdoor to disseminate false information to millions of Mail Online subscribers.

It is not clear if the hack was conducted by a foreign state actor or economically motivated hackers. The incident underscores the ways in which hackers increasingly use news media as a platform to spread disinformation, impacting a wide range of readers.

The cybersecurity expert at the Met Police, Detective Superintendent Helen Barragan, has reportedly urged journalists to increase their security measures. She said that hackers "won't think twice about using your reputation and credibility to achieve their ends", whether "it's to steal money, commit espionage or even interfere in the democratic processes".

It is clear that cybersecurity measures must be increasingly rigorous to tackle these threats. While hackers leverage the platform of news media to propagate misinformation, it is essential to protect the foundations of truthful, trustworthy, and reliable journalism.

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