Ukrainian hackers say they have infiltrated a key system operated by Russia’s Defense Ministry, an intelligence community has reported.
The group, which calls itself Cyber Resistance, shared details of its operation with the Ukrainian publication InformNapalm. Members of the group reportedly hacked the defense ministry’s Department of Information and Mass Communications and were able to gain access to a Russian media monitoring and analytics system called Katyusha.
From there, the group was able to obtain and internal documentation and study software used by Russian military propagandists. Newsweek has been unable to verify these claims as yet and contacted Russia’s Defense Ministry for comment via email on Tuesday.
NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA/AFP/Getty Images
The cyber guerrilla warfare group was reportedly able to view documents related to Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for Russia’s Defense Ministry. The Defense Ministry typically holds briefings daily led by Konashenkov, who outlines the progress of what Russia calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine. He has been described by Russian media as the face of the war.
Konashenkov has been head of the Defense Ministry’s Department of Information and Mass Communications since 2017, and in June 2022, he was awarded the military rank of lieutenant general by presidential decree.
The hackers viewed Konashenkov’s reports from the first few weeks of the Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022. One report stated that in the space of a month, Russian forces allegedly destroyed 1,500 Ukrainian tanks and more than 1,000 units of “special military equipment.” These figures have not been verified by Newsweek.
The hacking group also found that employees of the department monitor both Western and Russian media daily, give them “positive”, “negative”, or “neutral” labels, write up reports, and send them to Konashenkov’s desk.
Efforts have also been made to neutralize unreliable military bloggers on the Telegram messaging app viewed as critical of the war. The group was unable to gain access to the list of Telegram channels.
Cyber Resistance found that information about Russian troops withdrawing from a key position in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region was mentioned in a letter dated November 14. That information, credited to the defense ministry, was published a day earlier by Russian state-run media outlets Tass and RIA Novosti, before they quickly backtracked on that development.
The Russian Ministry of Defense dismissed the statements about the “regrouping” of the Dnieper Group of Forces as a “provocation”, without elaborating.
The term “regrouping” has previously been used by the Kremlin in Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine to describe a battlefield retreat by its forces.
The hackers said, after the news agencies reported that Russian forces had regrouped in the Kherson region, the Katyusha system gathered posts on Telegram that were seen as critical of the defense ministry.
“Russia, preparing for Putin’s elections, is most likely beginning the last wave of purges of Telegram from any manifestations of disloyalty to the Kremlin,” InformNapalm said.
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