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On Sunday evening and Monday night, it became known about cyber attacks on official applications for emergency alerts - the Ukrainian “Air Alert” and the application of the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations.
False notifications on the Ukrainian app began arriving at 22:47 Kyiv time on Sunday (20:47 GMT); According to them, a red air alert was declared throughout the country.
At 22:48, a notification in Russian arrived on the phones: “Hello! There will now be a nuclear alarm throughout Ukraine. Don’t worry, Hazel is flying!”
Residents of Kyiv and other cities of Ukraine also received notifications about the threat of radiation contamination, chemical attacks and street fighting. They called on people not to go outside.
A little later, the Air Force of the Ukrainian Armed Forces reported that the application “was subject to enemy influence.”
“There is no radiation threat! Stay calm and follow our posts on our channel!” - said the military.
It was reported that due to a glitch in the Air Raid app in the Lviv region, a signal about radiation danger was sounded through loudspeaker systems, but local authorities rushed to reassure the population, saying that there was no threat.
Ukraine's State Emergency Service subsequently reported that the national warning system was operating as normal.
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“All threat signals are transmitted to regional administrations and, accordingly, to street warning systems. Follow the official information of local authorities, and also focus on loudspeaker signals,” the State Emergency Service said.
The Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine said that the Air Raid app was temporarily disabled, and the developers said that they were working to restore the app after it was hacked.
“Today, unauthorized persons interfered with the operation of the application. We have disabled push notifications and temporarily suspended the application. The application does not store personal data, so there is no threat to users. Please do not under any circumstances follow links from suspicious notifications,” says a message on the app’s Telegram channel.
At night it became known that the application was gradually restoring operation.
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At about 2 a.m. Moscow time, the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations reported a cyber attack on its mobile application. As stated in the press service of the department, as a result, false information was sent to the population.
"Attention! The mobile application of the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations was subjected to a massive cyber attack, as a result of which the attackers managed to send fake information to the population,” the Ministry of Emergency Situations said.
They clarified that they are working to eliminate the vulnerability and restore normal functioning of the application. The agency also reported that the public warning system is operating as normal, and the cyber attack did not affect its operation.
“The warning system for the population of the Russian Federation is functioning normally. The hacking of the mobile application did not and cannot affect the operation of the public warning system,” the message says.
They added that informing the population is carried out through regional and municipal warning systems (sirens, loudspeakers), SMS messaging, as well as television and radio broadcasting.
The media reported that as a result of a hacker attack, users of the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry application were sent, in particular, notifications about the threat of a nuclear strike.
According to the Ukrainian publication UNN, the Ukrainian partisan movement Atesh took responsibility for hacking the Russian application.
A screenshot published by the Atesh movement (the authenticity of which the BBC could not confirm) calls for “urgently stocking up on food for three weeks and taking refuge in basements.” The text uses obscene language.
These cyber attacks coincided with the end of the silence regime in the Russian-occupied Aleshki, Kherson region (Ukrainian name - Oleshki), which had been in effect since October 27 to conduct a humanitarian mission and evacuate local residents.
“This was an important stage of joint humanitarian work with the participation of Russian Commissioner for Human Rights Yana Lantratova, with coordination from the First Lady of the United States Melania Trump,” Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights Dmitry Lubinets said on Sunday evening. — During this period, the parties complied with their obligations. This made it possible to deliver humanitarian aid to Oleshki and help civilians who wanted to leave the city safely.”
“Currently, together with Yana Lantratova, we are studying the possibilities of continuing such humanitarian initiatives. It is important to maintain this mechanism of interaction in order to continue to help people and save lives,” the ombudsman added.
US First Lady Melania Trump said that about 800 people were evacuated from Aleshki.
“The mission was a success, delivering vital aid to the region and evacuating nearly 800 people. On behalf of America, I commend Russia and Ukraine for their leadership and cooperation during the Oleshki ceasefire. I hope that the events in Oleshki will become the basis for lasting peace between the two countries,” she wrote on the social network X.
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