Midday meal website hacked to sell viagra

Jul 25, 2010 - Amita Verma |

Lucknow

The website of the UP government’s midday meal authority was hacked and advertisements selling Viagra, birth control pills, body building drugs and sleeping pills were posted on the site and the drugs were made available through online purchase.

The advertisements were uploaded in the feedback column on the website.
Though the links selling these drugs were deleted when the matter was brought to the notice of the concerned authorities on Wednesday, the same advertisements were uploaded again of Friday with 1,600 new links after which a FIR against unnamed persons was lodged at the Gomti Nagar police station. The feedback column has been completely deleted for now.
This is the first time that such “embarrassing” material has been uploaded on a government website in Uttar Pradesh.
All the drugs advertised on the website are in the scheduled drug category which cannot be sold without prescription by a doctor but they can easily be purchased through the links provided in the Authority’s website.
The drugs available for online purchase, without medical prescription, include Sildenafil Citrate, sold as Viagra, Revatio and under various other trade names. This is a drug used to treat erectile dysfunction and pulmonary arterial hypertension.
Also available online are Vardenafil, an oral drug that is used to treat impotency and Isotretinoin, a medication used for the treatment of severe acne. Drugs used as an appetite suppressant such as the Sibutramine and the Phendimetrazine to treat obesity are also available. The links of Ritalin used as central nervous system stimulant, anti-depressants like Sertraline Hydrochloride, Testosterone pills widely used for enhancing muscles and body building, sedatives like Ambien used for the short-term treatment of insomnia among other drugs can also be found.
Circle Officer Amit Pathak who is heading the probe team, meanwhile, ruled out hacking and said that some mischievous elements were using the facility of feedback to upload the advertisements. Officials investigating the case do not rule out the involvement of departmental staff. Those deployed to update the website and respond to the queries in the feedback column should have detected and reported this. It is obviously that someone here is conniving with the miscreants,” an official said.

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