Published on: October 9, 2024
On Oct. 7, Russian state media company VGTRK was the target of a significant cyberattack, which a Ukrainian government source attributed to Kyiv’s hackers. The attack coincided with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s 72nd birthday and was described by some sources as a “birthday present” from Ukrainian hackers.
“Ukrainian hackers ‘congratulated’ Putin on his birthday by carrying out a large-scale attack on the all-Russian state television and radio broadcasting company,” an unnamed source said.
Early reports indicated that VGTRK’s website was down, and its Rossiya-24 news channel was unavailable online. Viewers encountered messages stating, “503 Service Unavailable. No server is available to handle this request,” when trying to access the livestream.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed the attack, stating that the VGTRK was working to restore its services and investigate the incident.
“Our state media holding, one of the largest, has faced an unprecedented hacker attack on its digital infrastructure.”
An anonymous source cited by Russian news outlet Gazeta.ru mentioned that both online and internal services were severely disrupted, affecting internet and telephony connections within the VGTRK network.
Reports also suggested that the hackers managed to delete significant amounts of information from VGTRK’s servers, including backup copies.
The VGTRK breach is just one of many incidents that show how digital platforms have become another front in the ongoing struggle between the two countries. These attacks continue to cause disruptions that extend beyond the battlefield, impacting government operations, media outlets, and public communications.