TL;DRBrazil’s civil defense alert system was hacked, sending fake extreme alerts with the word “misantropi4” to millions of phones before the platform was shut down.
Hackers breached Brazil’s national civil defense alert system overnight, sending fake “Extreme Alert” notifications containing the word “misantropi4” to millions of mobile phones across at least seven states. The Civil Defense Alert platform was taken offline at 1:30 am on Saturday after the Ministry of Integration and Regional Development confirmed the intrusion.
The Federal Police has been activated to investigate. No timeframe has been given for when the platform will be restored.
The first unauthorized alert was registered around 11:40 pm on Friday, 19 June, in Paraná. Within hours, the same emergency sound, the type that bypasses silent mode and overrides whatever is on screen, reached phones in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasília, Bahia, Pará, Mato Grosso do Sul, and Acre.
National Secretary of Protection and Civil Defense Wolnei Wolff told a press conference that 10 alerts were tracked across various Brazilian states, with most sent via Cell Broadcast and at least one via SMS. The total number of phones affected was not officially disclosed, though German outlet Ad-hoc-News reported an estimate of approximately 30 million people reached.
