The International Criminal Court is now working with strict controls on its digital systems, according to sources and lawyers who work at the war crimes court on Thursday, after a hacking incident.
According to Reuters, two solicitors said that the court had severed the majority of its internet-accessible systems, meaning that staff members are unable to access e-mail or documents from locations where they are not physically present.
The Hague, Netherlands-based International Criminal Court first acknowledged a “cybersecurity incident” on Tuesday, saying it was attempting to maintain the “core work” of the court.
On Thursday, hearings in the trial of two men began again. They are charged with organising militias who attacked Muslim residents in the Central African Republic.
The public and journalists could watch proceedings in the galleries, but the court’s livestream was down and there was no sound.
“As the defence team, we do have limited access to the court systems,” Geert-Jan Knoops, the lawyer who represents one of the suspects, Patrice-Edouard Ngaissona, told Reuters.
Alfred Yekatom, a co-defendant with Ngaissona, pleaded not guilty plea.
According to Mylene Dimitri, who is defending Yekatom, she was communicating with other parties using paper binders and USB flash drives.
“Exchanging information via USB flash drives and paper binders, delivering information personally from office-to-office.” Mylene Dimitri, who’s defending Yekatom, told Reuters
This entails physically transporting information from office to office because the court’s typical email and electronic file sharing did not function.
