The human rights organization Prisoners Defenders reported a cyberattack on Thursday targeting their website and database of political prisoners in Cuba. This occurred just moments after they released a report documenting a record 1,351 individuals listed in their registry as of the end of September.
Impact on Information Access
The attack led to temporary disruptions in accessing critical information, which is used by detainees' families, international organizations, diplomats, and media outlets to monitor the status of Cuban political prisoners.
Details of the Cyberattack
In a statement issued from Madrid, Prisoners Defenders described the attack as a coordinated flood of automated requests from hundreds of IP addresses, aimed at overwhelming their servers and disabling their platforms. This tactic, known as a denial-of-service (DoS) attack, attempts to block access to a website through excessive traffic, without necessarily breaching the systems or stealing data.
Response and Security Measures
The organization assured that their security measures and providers successfully repelled the attack. "There has been no data breach, loss, or alteration. The political prisoners' database and family information remain intact and secure," they confirmed. Affected services have been restored, according to the statement.
Unresolved Origins of the Attack
While Prisoners Defenders believes the attack was intentional, the perpetrators remain unidentified. Their technical analysis detected the use of commercial cloud servers configured to obscure the true source of the requests, suggesting a coordinated operation with significant resources. However, the statement lacks an independent assessment to publicly verify this conclusion or attribute the attack to a specific person, institution, or government.
The organization views the timing as a "coherent, almost evident pattern" of an attempt to silence their documentation of human rights violations in Cuba during its peak dissemination.
Coinciding with Record Political Prisoner Numbers
The cyberattack coincided with the release of Prisoners Defenders' September 2026 report, which recorded 1,351 political prisoners and prisoners of conscience, the highest number documented by the organization to date. The report included 50 new verified cases and noted 38 removals from the previous list.
Among those listed are 152 women and 40 individuals who were minors at the time of their arrest. The organization also highlighted the poor health conditions of political prisoners, documenting 476 inmates with illnesses who remain incarcerated, many without adequate access to medication and medical care, according to their research.
This incident adds to previous reports of cyberattacks against independent media and human rights organizations in Cuba. In July 2026, the independent outlet elTOQUE reported a massive digital assault, with its protection systems detecting approximately 124.85 million suspicious requests in less than three hours.
Understanding the Cyberattack on Prisoners Defenders
What was the nature of the attack on Prisoners Defenders?
The attack was a denial-of-service (DoS) attack, characterized by a flood of automated requests from numerous IP addresses to overwhelm and disable the organization's servers.
Did the attack result in any data loss or breaches?
No, Prisoners Defenders confirmed that there was no data breach, loss, or alteration. The data remains secure and intact.
Has the source of the cyberattack been identified?
The perpetrators of the attack have not yet been identified. The use of commercial cloud servers was noted, complicating the identification of the true source of the requests.