Voting for Martinique’s anthem, flag interrupted by cyberattack

BOGOTA, Colombia

Barely 24 hours after the start of online voting to select a new flag and anthem of the French Caribbean island of Martinique, the site had to close Wednesday because of a cyberattack.

Residents were to vote Jan. 2 - 13 on the adoption of their first official flag and hymn.

The country does not have an official flag but residents on the island of more than 370,000 people have unofficially used a red, green and black flag. The French flag is used at government buildings.

Nineteen proposals and four anthems were submitted to a vote. The proposals were chosen by a technical committee made up of experts from civil society and qualified personalities from the island. More than 500 proposals were submitted by the people of Martinique.

Authorities said a group of hackers activated voting robots to take control of the server created by the Territorial Collectivity of Martinique (CTM).

Fortunately, the hackers did not succeed in "saturating the existing servers," according to the CTM. The vote nevertheless had to be interrupted but will resume shortly.

A prize of €8,000 ($8,500) will be awarded to the submitters of the winning flag and anthem.