Hackers Attack Russian State Media on Putin's Birthday

The state broadcasting company of Russia, which owns and operates the country's main national television stations, was the target of a large-scale cyber attack on Monday, October 8. The company's website and the online service of the 'Russia-24' network, a 24-hour news channel, were unavailable online, and according to Reuters, users received a message stating: 'Service 503 is unavailable. No server is available to handle this request.' Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, confirmed the occurrence of this attack and stated that specialists are trying to trace the perpetrators. A Ukrainian government source, who requested anonymity, claimed that Ukrainian hackers were responsible for this incident. He stated that the Ukrainian hackers carried out this large-scale attack as a gift to Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia, on his birthday. Reuters reported that it could not independently verify this claim. The 'Gazeta.Aryo' news agency, citing an anonymous source, announced that the hackers targeted online and internal services. 'Online broadcasting and internal services have been disrupted, and even internet and phone services are not working. Repairing these things will take a long time. I heard that the hackers wiped everything from the servers, including backup copies.' Maria Zakharova, the spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, also referred to something called 'the West as a whole' without specifying the perpetrator of this attack, stating that the recent attack is part of this group's actions; a 'hybrid war.' She mentioned that Moscow would raise the issue of this attack in all international forums, including UNESCO, which promotes freedom of expression.