Tech

Russian News Outlet Forced Offline by Cyberattack, Anonymous Claims Responsibility

REVENGE

The Anonymous hacking collective claimed responsibility for the DDoS attack that briefly took down Russian “propaganda station,” as they called it, RT.com.

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Niklas Halle'n/Getty

Hackers associated with the Anonymous collective claimed responsibility Thursday night for cyberattacks that briefly took down a number of websites identified with the Russian government—in retaliation, they said, for the Ukraine invasion. Russian state news site RT.com confirmed the malicious distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, claiming they’d “been able to repel the hit.” Calling the outlet a “propaganda station,” an Anonymous Twitter account said it was exacting revenge for the “brutal invasion” of Ukraine. The collective was “currently involved in operations against the Russian Federation,” the main account associated with the group tweeted earlier on Thursday, saying that its goal was “only peace in the world.”

On Wednesday, the Associated Press reported, Russian-affiliated forces launched a number of malware attacks against Ukrainian government websites and banking organizations. Russia’s military and Kremlin sites were also under attack on Thursday, either unreachable or slow to load.