Government portals, hospital websites and school services went offline around the world on Wednesday as operators rushed to defend their systems against two critical software vulnerabilities.

The disruption was linked to flaws in PHP, a programming language used to run as many as 70 percent of websites worldwide.

Services in several countries, including the Netherlands, Finland, France and Denmark, were temporarily taken offline as organizations sought to prevent a potential cyberattack.

The US National Security Agency (NSA) and FBI urged organizations running PHP to take vulnerable systems offline if they could not install the available security updates immediately.

The technology is used by major US websites and services such as Etsy, Wikipedia and NASA.gov, highlighting PHP’s role across online retail, information platforms and government operations.

Cybersecurity agencies in Europe, Australia, Japan and Britain issued similar warnings, telling PHP users to apply the patches without delay or take affected sites offline until they could be secured.

The vulnerabilities could enable hackers to seize control of affected servers without a password or user account. Attackers could then steal data stored on the server or hijack a trusted website to launch attacks against visitors.

Cloudflare, an internet infrastructure and security provider, reported evidence of attacks as website operators worked to deploy the emergency fixes.

Cybersecurity firm Huntress wrote in a blog post: ‘PHP is everywhere. It quietly powers WordPress, ​Drupal, Joomla and Magento sites, shared hosting platforms, control panels, and an awful lot of software that doesn’t even advertise that it runs PHP under ⁠the hood.’

Both flaws relate to the way PHP manages server memory. One can cause the software to mishandle data during memory errors, while the other enables it to reuse information after that memory has already been released.

The full scale of the attacks is not yet known, although cybersecurity platform Patchstack said it had received ‘reports of active exploitation.’

The security team responsible for maintaining PHP reportedly issued patches at 10am ET to address the vulnerabilities.

Operators are now racing to install the updates before hackers use AI to analyze the patches and develop methods for attacking systems that remain exposed.

Thai Duong, chief executive of Calif, the security company that discovered the flaws, told The Wall Street Journal: ‘Some dude on Twitter could take the patches and run AI against it and post some exploit script.’

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He added: ‘All hell will break loose.’

CERT-EU, the European Union’s technical cybersecurity advisory body, said: ‘Organizations should consider isolating internet-facing applications from public networks until a fix is available.’

In the Netherlands, several organizations followed the example of the National Cyber Security Center and took public-facing websites offline.

Those included the Port of Rotterdam, government portal Overheid.nl, the national soccer association KNVB, the websites of the country’s five largest political parties and several hospital websites.

Danish municipal IT company Kombit said it shut down several ⁠services, including ​the national school communication platform, a spokesperson told Reuters.

Disruption was even more widespread in Finland, where state IT services provider ​Valtori said government public network services had been taken offline ‘as a precautionary measure.’ 

France’s Interior Ministry said it had temporarily taken local government administrative websites offline while awaiting a security fix.

AI-assisted hacking campaigns, which have proliferated in recent weeks, could magnify the threat, said Lukasz Olejnik, a visiting senior research fellow at King’s College London.

‘The scale is huge,’ Olejnik said. ‘And with AI, exploitation may happen instantly, on a large scale.’ 

PHP is a programming language used to run websites. When a visitor loads a page, a server running PHP assembles the content and sends it to the browser. 

Rather than target victims individually, attackers could scan ⁠the internet for systems running vulnerable versions of PHP.

New York state court officers endorsed Republican Bruce Blakeman for governor Wednesday, marking the first time in at least two decades that the unions have supported a candidate for the state’s highest office.

The Supreme Court Officers and Court Officers associations said they were backing the Nassau County executive because “he has made public safety a central part of his public service.” The unions also accused Gov. Kathy Hochul and New York’s Democratic leaders of allowing their ranks to shrink and leaving officers vulnerable on the job.

“This election is about more than politics, it’s about public safety, respect for the rule of law,” Patrick Cullen, president of the New York State Supreme Court Officers Association, said at a news conference outside Manhattan Criminal Court.

“Bruce Blakeman has made public safety a central part of his public service,” Cullen said. “His record as Nassau County executive and his emphasis on supporting law enforcement reflects the priorities that court officers want to see taken seriously at the state level.”

Sgt. Thomas Hickey, who leads the state Court Officers Association, said the union had reviewed endorsements from “20-something years” ago but could not recall publicly supporting a gubernatorial candidate.

“And one of us, no matter how far we went back, can remember endorsing a Republican,” he said.

Union leaders said the number of court officers has declined under Hochul and the state’s Democratic leadership. They also pointed to aging courthouse security equipment and what they described as more violent offenders moving through courthouses because of lax bail reform laws that have created a revolving door in the justice system.

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“They see that the people coming in don’t have any regard for law and order inside the courthouse,” Hickey said. “They realize there is no consequences for being disruptive so they come back and commit crimes again and again inside the courthouse.”

Hickey said metal detectors at courthouse entrances are outdated and can be bypassed too easily.

“These people are bringing in 4D weapons that are not picked up by magnetometers,” he said. “So, what you have is a situation where there’s less court officers because we’re short staffed, and there are guys coming in with a knife that they can’t detect.”

Blakeman, who trails Hochul in the polls with the election just two weeks away, has made public safety a central theme of his campaign. He has repeatedly criticized Democrats in Albany and New York City, accusing them of underfunding police departments, allowing violent offenders to remain free under lax bail laws and failing to support law enforcement.

“Kathy Hochul, her priority is are all upside down,” Blakeman told reporters. “After this year we will have spent $10 billion on illegal migrants who just claim asylum. They get free food, free housing, free transportation, free cell phone and free health care.”

“That’s money that I would be spending on law enforcement, on our court system, on infrastructure, on our schools, are on our hospitals,” he said. “Cutting taxes and cutting utility bills.”

The two unions represent about 4,000 active and retired members combined. Their officers patrol courthouses and maintain order in courtrooms across New York state.

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A Massachusetts woman has been accused by the U.S. Department of Justice of orchestrating sham marriages designed to help clients obtain green cards and, ultimately, U.S. citizenship.

Jennifer Gonzalez, a U.S. citizen, allegedly charged as much as $40,000 for each marriage and arranged up to 20 such unions annually over the past decade, according to Leah Foley, U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts.

Authorities said Gonzalez’s female employees, who also face charges, married men seeking legal immigration status in the United States.

“This conspiracy netted her $6 million during the course of the alleged scam,” Foley said Wednesday at a news conference at the Moakley Federal Courthouse in Boston. She added that Gonzalez boasted about investing the proceeds in businesses and property in the Dominican Republic, which she repeatedly called “my country.”

According to prosecutors, Gonzalez revealed details of the alleged operation to a witness cooperating with federal investigators. Foley said Gonzalez believed the person was an undocumented immigrant.

Gonzalez, 43, allegedly told the witness—who was recording the conversation—that Massachusetts was “so special” because it is a sanctuary state where “illegal aliens get a lot of help as an immigrant.”

She also allegedly said she wanted to give each of her children land in the Dominican Republic that they could own in the future.

“Miss Gonzalez got rich off selling the American dream, all the while investing her money in another country,” Foley said.

Foley said Gonzalez told the witness she stopped arranging fraudulent marriages at the end of 2024 because President Donald Trump was returning to office. She allegedly ended the operation altogether in 2025, saying immigration enforcement had become “a little harsh.”

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Prosecutors identified Gonzalez as the alleged “ringleader” of the operation, which involved several other alleged co-conspirators.

Amara Pugh, Gonzalez’s 31-year-old secretary, as well as Jessica Tavares, 31; Erica Daniels, 29; and Jaylin Hill, 26, allegedly received payment to marry Gonzalez’s clients. Prosecutors also accused Gonzalez of entering into a sham marriage with an undocumented immigrant herself.

Court records released by the Justice Department included photographs from at least two of the alleged marriage ceremonies.

Officials said the women generally remained married to the men for years before divorcing them. Some then married other undocumented immigrants as soon as one month after their divorces.

Foley also said Gonzalez allegedly defrauded the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, by applying for and receiving benefits from 2019 through 2026. Prosecutors say she collected more than $124,000 from the program during that period.

“She did not list her income from her sham marriage business and did not list anyone else in her household, not the illegal alien she married and not the father of her children, who she referred to as her husband,” Foley said.

The Justice Department said Gonzalez, Pugh, Tavares and two other alleged conspirators were arrested Wednesday morning. Hill was already serving a state prison sentence for a gun offense.

Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine says she is “troubled” by claims that Somali interpreters accompanied migrant women into polling stations and directed them on how to cast their ballots.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Collins said she had only recently heard about the allegations and expressed concern about the integrity and security of Maine’s upcoming midterm elections.

“Certainly only Americans should be voting in American elections,” Collins said.

“It is troubling to me if people are being accompanied into voting booths and handling ballots in a way that is not sanctioned by law.”

The allegations surfaced Tuesday in a report by The Maine Wire, which said its journalists witnessed several elderly Somali residents being guided through polling locations.

The report alleged that interpreters escorted voters, operated buses from housing complexes to polling sites and, in some cases, instructed people on how to vote. The claims have not been independently verified.

According to the outlet, the interpreters were affiliated with taxpayer-funded nonprofit organizations and Medicaid agencies that had been mobilized as early voting began ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.

The alleged activity was reported in Lewiston, Maine, a city known for having one of New England’s largest Somali communities.

The controversy comes as Collins faces one of the most difficult re-election campaigns of her career. Most polling shows a close contest between the Republican incumbent and Democratic challenger Troy Jackson.

InsiderAdvantage recently put Jackson two percentage points ahead, while a separate Washington Post poll showed the Democrat leading by four points.

Collins had initially been running against oyster farmer Graham Platner, who withdrew from the race after facing allegations of sexual misconduct. Platner denied the claims.

Jackson has also faced controversy during the campaign, including revelations that he fathered children with his second cousin.

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The Senate race has drawn national attention because it could influence the balance of power in Congress after the midterms. Its outcome may help determine whether Republicans retain control of the chamber.

Earlier this month, Jackson came under fire for telling Collins to “shut up” during a heated debate exchange.

The confrontation began after a protester opposing data centers interrupted Collins while she was answering a question during the event.

As moderators worked to remove the protester, Collins criticized her opponent, saying: “So this is obviously one of Troy’s supporters.”

‘Oh shut up,’ Jackson fired back. ‘I don’t even know that kid,’ to which Collins responded, ‘Oh, right.’

Jackson refused to apologize for the jab at Collins, and doubled down in a post-debate interview with CNN as he said he had no regrets. 

‘I’ve had four debates with Senator Collins. I’ve shook her hand afterward every time. But what I’m not going to be is talked down to by Senator Collins. I’m not going to, you know, be accused of things like that,’ he said. 

Collins then escalated the feud, suggesting Jackson’s remark reflected a broader pattern in how he deals with women who challenge him.

‘I was struck by how reflexive the response, ‘Oh, shut up,’ was,’ Collins told Fox News.

‘But then I thought about the reputation Troy Jackson has in Augusta, particularly when he’s dealing with women with whom he disagrees. So in some ways, it didn’t surprise me.’

The Daily Mail has contacted Collins, Jackson and the Maine Bureau of Elections for comment.  

There’s always room for improvement — especially when it comes to pizza.

Connecticut’s campaign to convince Americans that it is the country’s pizza capital has seemingly gone flat. A new poll has crowned New York the top pizza state, dealing another blow to Connecticut’s taxpayer-funded promotional push.

Connecticut landed a disappointing 16th in the nationwide ranking, leaving state representatives frustrated. The survey, compiled by Maine Lobster Now using Google Reviews, placed the Nutmeg State behind places not typically associated with pizza, including Texas, Oregon and Missouri.

“Eat our words? Not a chance. We’ll be eating another slice of Connecticut pizza,” Morgan Nyerick, director of Connecticut Statewide Marketing & Tourism, told The Post in response to the survey.

“We have tremendous respect for Maine Lobster Now when it comes to lobster, but we’ll keep the pizza title right here in Connecticut. After all, we did put ‘Welcome to Connecticut, Home of the Pizza Capital of the US’ on our highway signs. So, we’re pretty committed at this point,” she added.

“New York can celebrate its ranking, and we’ll happily keep celebrating our pizza. And if anyone at Maine Lobster Now wants to come down and enjoy a slice, we’d be delighted to show them around.”

Unfortunately for Connecticut, the numbers tell a different story.

New York claimed the top spot, with 43.05% of its statewide Google reviews rated positively.

New Jersey followed in second place with 39%, while Rhode Island ranked third at 36.26%, according to figures curated by Maine Lobster Now.

Missouri also made the top 10, while Wisconsin and Utah finished ahead of Connecticut.

Connecticut, home to New Haven’s famed apizza, posted a customer satisfaction rate of just 29.20%. That result comes despite the state launching a pizza rivalry in 2024, when it claimed its slices were better than New York’s.

The Connecticut Office of State Marketing and Tourism even placed a series of billboards in Manhattan and Brooklyn featuring provocative slogans, including “Connecticut Pizza Wins. NYC Takes The L” and “The Nation’s Best Pizza. Not You, New York.”

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Connecticut was not the only pizza powerhouse to struggle. Illinois, home of Chicago deep dish, finished 19th, with only 27.23% of its reviews receiving positive marks.

Still, New York pizza makers say there was never much doubt about which state deserved the top ranking.

“It’s 100% true and 100% accurate. I don’t think any other state is even close to messing with us when it comes to pizza. We’re the top dogs,” said Michael Vendome, owner of Fermento in the West Village.

New York is home to the “most innovative pizza guys,” Vendome said, pointing to the wide range of styles, shapes and flavors available across the state.

At Fermento, for instance, the dough undergoes a 72-hour fermentation process. Just down the block, customers can find a more traditional New York slice.

“There’s no other state that you could go to where you could find all these styles done well — done great — compared to what we are doing in New York,” Vendome said.

“And I think we have the best people making it personally, the most passionate and the best. There’s a reason why most of the best pizzas come from New York.”

The state’s extraordinary variety of pizza styles, combined with its sheer number of pizzerias, has fostered a level of competition that encourages New York chefs to keep improving, theorized Michael Ayoub, chef and owner of Fornino in Brooklyn.

“We are the best in the country. I could have told you that — They didn’t have to do all this type of investigation if they had called me up first. I would have saved somebody a lot of trouble,” said Ayoub, who is celebrating 24 years of his business Tuesday.

When it comes to Connecticut trying to get in on the cheese, Ayoub cheekily said: “My mother always said: if you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

“But I’ll just say this: Tsk, tsk, tsk.”