The theft of pollution permits that forced the closure of the spot market in EU emissions permits last week may have originated in Romania, a Greek police official said on Saturday (29 January).
Police identified between eight and 10 Internet protocol addresses which hackers used to attack Greece's national registry for carbon trading rights, said the official, who declined to be named.
"We have located the addresses in Romania. Interpol has been notified," the official said.
The spot market for EU emissions permits was closed after allowances worth up to 30 million euros were stolen from the national registries of several European countries.
National registries are the place where so-called EU allowances (EUAs) are electronically assigned to trading companies and polluters in the EU emissions trading scheme, the bloc's chief weapon against climate change.
The theft, possibly a concerted hacker attack, was the latest in a string of scandals and added to factors discouraging other countries from adopting similar cap-and-trade systems.
The market remained shut on Friday, two days after a European Commission deadline for a phased re-start.
In a statement on Friday (28 January), the EU executive said national registries will be reopened onlyonce authorities "give reasonable assurances that the minimum security requirements are in place".
EU countries have started submitting reports of measures taken, the Commission indicated, adding that more reports are expected "in the coming days".
"However, some national registries are not likely to complete their reports for several weeks," the Commission warned.
"Current expectations are that the first national registries may be able to resume normal operations in the second half of the week beginning 31 January 2011," it said.