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Breaking: SEC Website Goes Dark, Bitcoin Tumbles in Aftermath

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) website went down on Friday night but came back online during publication. The institution has not yet provided official reasons, and social media rumors suggest that a DDoS attack may have occurred.

The online community also noted that the SEC website downtime coincided with a stronger drop in Bitcoin (BTC), which is currently losing 4.4%, falling back below the $70,000 level.

SEC Website Not Working, DDoS Attack Speculations

The initial reports that the SEC website had stopped working began to appear around 3 AM GMT. For the next 5 hours, the situation did not change, and attempting to access SEC.gov redirected to SEC.gov/core/install.php, which displayed the message "Page not found." However, at the time of writing, the website was again operational.

JustDario 🏊‍♂️
@DarioCpx

3 hours after since the first reports, #SEC website is still down… https://t.co/nSG1hiiUPf pic.twitter.com/GNYbDvshpe

Mar 15, 2024

Apart from fragmentary information on X (formerly Twitter), it has been difficult to find more details online about what caused the SEC website outage, when exactly it occurred, and how long it may last.

However, there are speculations that a DDoS attack or cyberattack on the domain of the U.S. regulator may have occurred.

WayneTech SPFX®️
@WayneTechSPFX

Cybersec. SEC. Website. Tech intel:#BREAKING The Security Exchange Commission[SEC] website has been taken down.

Either ddos attack. Or cyberattack.https://t.co/rKGhSyrstT

Developing... pic.twitter.com/M5UecqPluW

Mar 15, 2024

Interestingly, some services offered through the domain were still working. One of them was the EDGAR search engine, which is the register of U.S. companies supervised by the commission.

It's worth remembering that two months ago, there was turmoil online related to a potential hack targeting the SEC. However, at that time, it involved an agency-owned X account, and the downtime coincided with the waiting period for the approval of the first spot Bitcoin ETF in the USA.

Bitcoin Began Dropping at the Same Time

Interestingly, Twitter users pointed out that the moment the SEC website went offline, it coincided with stronger drops in Bitcoin, which also began in the middle of the night (GMT time).

Currently, BTC is falling more than 4% and hitting daily lows at the $66,800 level, clearly dropping below $77,000 and moving nearly 10% away from historical highs.

Vladdy 🐸
@VisualsVlad

The sec website is down from possible ddos attacks, and #Bitcoin has lost 5k in value since it happened..

Coincidence? 🖤🦢🩸

Mar 15, 2024

The drop is most likely just a coincidence, especially since the SEC website's return to online did not cause the exchange rate to rebound.