Security News > 2023 > March > Australian woman arrested for email bombing a government office
The Australian Federal Police arrested a woman in Werrington, Sydney, for allegedly email bombing the office of a Federal Member of Parliament.
Email bombing is an online attack where attackers bombard an email address with thousands of emails to overwhelm a recipient's inbox or mail server.
The AFP says the women sent over 32,000 emails to the MP's office over 24 hours, preventing employees from using the IT systems and the public from contacting the office.
"Police will allege the woman used multiple domains to send 32,397 emails over a 24-hour period until her arrest, which resulted in continued disruption and harassment," explains the Australian Federal Police.
Although the AFP does not elaborate on the exact means by which the arrested woman sent a large volume of emails to the MP office within such a short time, they state that the attack used multiple domains when sending the emails.
The attacker might have used scripts that automate registering the target's email address to many websites, which then sent registration confirmations to the MP office.