Whilst part of the new Animal Welfare Law in Spain dictates that pets must be registered, the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries in the Valencia region has reported a cyber-attack on the database of the Supramunicipal Register of companion animals, which is managed by the Valencian Council of Veterinary Colleges with the computer application known as RIVIA.
The Generalitat Valenciana has already notified the Spanish Data Protection Agency of the incident and has lodged a complaint with the National Police Force’s Electronic Crimes Group.
The necessary measures have been taken immediately to minimise the negative effects of the attack, they say, and are in constant communication with the IT services of the General Directorate of Information Technologies and Communications and the IT services of the Veterinary Council.
To block the cyber-attack, appropriate technical measures have been applied and an action plan has been designed to improve the overall security of the current application.
Unauthorised access due to credential theft includes personal data of pet owners, such as name, surname, address, telephone, ID and email, hosted on the RIVIA.
The RIVIA computer application is managed externally by the Ministry of Agriculture, so the cyber-attack does not compromise the computer systems of the DGTIC or other information systems of the Generalitat.
Despite the multiple security measures implemented in the RIVIA application, the attack managed to breach the system and in the face of computer crimes to which these systems are exposed, total protection cannot be guaranteed.
