AUGUSTA, Bangor — The state of Maine’s official government website, Maine.gov, was briefly knocked offline Monday morning.

A hacker group using the Twitter handle Vikingdom2015 claimed responsibility for taking down both Maine.gov and New Hampshire’s VisitNH.gov. Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap confirmed that Maine.gov was taken down by an “external attack.”





Gov. Paul LePage issued a statement early Monday afternoon offering assurances that the incident did not include a security breach or compromise any personal information. The administration referred to the problem as a “denial-of-service attack.”

“It appears a ‘denial-of-service attack’ made the state’s official website, Maine.gov, temporarily unavailable,” said Department of Administrative and Financial Services spokesman Alex Willette in the statement. “Attacks to high-profile government websites are very common, and a thorough investigation is underway. The important thing to note is that this was in no way a security breach, and we currently have no evidence to suggest that any personal information has been compromised.”

Vikingdom2015 has taken responsibility for “denial of service” attacks on other government websites, such as Oklahoma City’s okc.gov.

https://twitter.com/Vikingdom2015/status/579990060889550848