NWO application system down after ‘failed cyber attack’

What was initially described as a technical issue has now put NWO’s ISAAC application system out of commission for almost a week. The research funding body has now reported the incident as a cyber attack and announced that its application system will stay offline for security reasons until next Monday at the earliest.

An NWO spokesperson refers to “failed attempts at infiltration”. There appears to be no damage to NWO’s systems and no data has been stolen.

Fallback option
The scientific community uses ISAAC to apply to NWO for research funding. Tuesday afternoon was the deadline to apply for Take-off, a programme that provides financial support to scientists looking to bring innovative research results to market. As a fallback option, applicants are now being asked to send their applications by email.

“It’s a major inconvenience for researchers that the system is not working”, the spokesperson says. “As things stand, we are still in the dark regarding the culprit and the motive. It may not even have been a targeted attack.” ISAAC should be up and running again on Monday, August 26.

In 2021, NWO was brought to a standstill by a successful hack. At the time, ISAAC was the only part of the system not to be affected. It was also taken offline as a security measure at the time.