Did you complete the 2016 census last night? No? Don’t worry, you are in good company.
Last night, as social media went into a #census fail frenzy, it appeared that the ABS Census website had crashed.
This morning however, the ABS have announced that they deliberately shut down the site to prevent overseas hackers getting their hands on our data.
Speaking to the ABC this morning, chief statistician David Kalisch said that site was targeted by four denial of service (DoS) attacks.
“The first three [attacks] caused minor disruption, but more than two million forms were successfully submitted and safely stored.
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“After the fourth attack, which took place just after 7.30pm [AEST], the ABS took the precaution of closing down the system to ensure the integrity of the data,” Kalisch said.
The entire census has been farcical to say the least, so it’s not surprising that #censusfail is still tending this morning. Here are our favourite tweets so far.
BREAKING: ABS 'at a complete loss' to explain Australia's population plummeting to 1.2 million. #CensusFail
— Kenny Devine (@TheKennyDevine) August 9, 2016
When you feel your grand plan slowly unravelling… #CensusFail pic.twitter.com/TzYHOBclLC
— Josh Butler (@JoshButler) August 9, 2016
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If only they'd have known how many of us would have been accessing the site.. https://t.co/4t78Mzyxnx #CensusFail pic.twitter.com/itXconqrcw
— Intuitive IT (@intuitiveit) August 9, 2016
#CensusFail: Here's what Australians are doing as @ABSStats tries to get things back online https://t.co/q71yCpxtjU pic.twitter.com/sqNDrO2RG2
— ABC News (@abcnews) August 9, 2016
"It wasn't me! A stranger came in, broke the toy & then ran away again" @ABSCensus channeling a 5 year old to explain #censusfail meltdown
— Bruce Healy (@brucehealy) August 9, 2016
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