Pierluigi Paganini March 05, 2024

The Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense claims that it hacked the Russian Ministry of Defense.

The Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense announced it had breached the Russian Ministry of Defense servers as part of a special operation, and exfiltrated confidential documents.

Stolen documents include:

• confidential documents, including orders and reports circulated among over 2000 structural units of the Russian military service.
• software used by the Russian Ministry of Defense to encrypt and protect its data.
• a collection of secret service documents belonging to the Russian Ministry of War

The stolen documents allowed intelligence analysts of Ukraine’s GUR to delineate the comprehensive structure of the Russian Ministry of Defense system and its various units.

The documents revealed the leadership of the Russian Ministry, including other high-ranking officials within the divisions of Russian Ministry of Defense. This encompasses deputies, assistants, and specialists, individuals who used the electronic document management systems known as ‘bureaucrat.'”

“Cyber ​​specialists of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine implemented another successful special operation against the aggressor state of Russia – as a result of the attack, it was possible to gain access to the servers of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.” reads the press release published by Ukraine’s GUR. “Now the Ukrainian special service has the information protection and encryption software used by the morph, as well as an array of secret service documents of the Russian Ministry of War.”

According to the press release, the GUR also stole the documents belonging to the Deputy Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Timur Vadimovich Ivanov.

In November, Ukraine’s intelligence service announced they had hacked Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency, ‘Rosaviatsia.’ The attack is the result of another complex special cyber operation.

Rosaviatsia is the government agency responsible for the oversight and regulation of civil aviation in Russia. The agency’s primary role is to ensure the safety, security, and efficiency of air transport within the country.

The state-sponsored hackers claimed to have stolen sensitive documents that contained proof of a crisis in Russia’s aviation industry.

The announcement marked the first time that a government admitted to having used hacking as part of its military strategy during a conflict.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, data breach)