Argentina investigating cyberattack after emails sent describing Egypt win as ‘robbery’

The Argentine Football Federation (AFA) has been forced to investigate whether its systems were hacked after mass emails were sent to journalists calling for “justice” for Egypt and its head coach Hossam Hassan after the dramatic World Cup round-of-16 match between the teams on Tuesday.

At least one reporter from The Athletic received one of the hacked emails. The email, written in English, included the subject line “SYSTEM HACKED: UNFAIR DECISION” and begins with “the robbery will not go unnoticed.”

The AFA confirmed Thursday it was looking into an incident where emails were “possibly” sent from one of its accounts that were “neither generated nor authorized by our team.”

The match between Argentina and Egypt will be remembered as one of the most dramatic games in World Cup history, with Argentina coming back from a two-goal deficit by scoring three goals in the final 13 minutes of play.

But it was Egypt’s disallowed goal in the 60th minute, canceled after VAR review, and a potential foul in Argentina’s penalty box that set off the ongoing debate about officiating and conspiracies of favoritism in the competition.

The Egyptian team was left angered by several refereeing decisions, with star forward Mostafa Ziko saying after the game that the trophy is “directed towards Argentina.” Egypt’s head coach also claimed his side was wrongly denied that second goal and that Egypt should have been awarded a penalty in stoppage time moments before Enzo Fernandez scored Argentina’s third goal. The coach said he will “never watch the World Cup again, because there’s no justice in this competition.”

The sentiment from the Egyptian team aligns with the email sent by hackers through AFA’s accounts.

The email seen by The Athletic is signed by “All Egyptian Cyber Warriors.” It describes Argentina’s win as “stolen.” While addressing the world, the message begins, “Security is an illusion, just like the integrity of that match.”

The message described the game as “90 minutes of unfair refereeing” and claims Egypt’s coach was “targeted for standing with Palestine.” Hassan has repeatedly used his platform to show support for Palestine, including at this summer’s World Cup.

The email concludes: “If there is no justice on the pitch, do not expect peace in your networks. Consider this transmission a permanent record of our protest.”

The AFA said in a statement it would conduct the necessary checks with its IT department, while asking those who received the messages to ignore them.

“There is a possibility that our account has been subject to unauthorized access,” the AFA said. “We are currently working to clarify the situation and implement the necessary security measures.”

The federation added it would analyze the incident to determine its origin and scope.

When reached Friday, an AFA spokesperson directed The Athletic to its previous statement, adding that there was nothing more to add because the situation had been “resolved.”

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