Anonymous has announced it's hacked into the website of the company believed to be running the Ukrainian nuclear power plant seized by Russia, leaving a short but clear message for employees.
Ukraine officials informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that Russia was planning to take full control of the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant under the management of state nuclear energy firm Rosatom.
The Zaporizhzhya site, Europe's largest nuclear power plant, was seized by Russian forces on March 4 where a fire broke out and was extinguished, leading to international concern of a potential nuclear accident.
Amid news that Rosatom officials are now working with the Russian military at the plant, Anonymous has revealed it managed to hack into and deface the Rosatom website and is starting to ‘leak gigabytes of data’.
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The hacktivist group, which continues with an ongoing cyberattack against Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, added the following message to its announcement: “No, it's not the nuclear plant that was hacked, we would never endanger any lives. The website was hacked.”
A screenshot of the defaced website was shared with Taiwan News, showing a message Anonymous left to Rosatom employees and the Russian troops who have seized the plant.
It reads, “Expect us / we do not forget / we do not forgive / we are legion,” alongside the hashtags ‘OpRussia’, ‘Anonymous’, ‘OpKremlin’ and, perhaps the most pertinent, ‘FCKPTN’.
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For anyone who didn’t quite get that last message, it stands for ‘f**k Putin’.
Earlier today, Anonymous claimed it had also taken out Russia’s national security agency, writing on Twitter: “Russian sites under attack [Tango Down],” the latter statement relating to military slang meaning an enemy has been defeated in combat.
Among the sites Anonymous claimed to have taken down are Moscow.ru, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), Analytical Center for the Government of the Russian Federation and the Ministry of Sport of the Russian Federation.
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FSB is the principal security agency within the country and the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB.
This comes after the group launched a cyber offensive against Putin, which included a chilling warning telling him his 'secrets may no longer be safe'.
And just last week, Anonymous said it had hacked Russian TV news channels and streaming services to broadcast footage of the war in Ukraine.
The group said it was involved in the ‘biggest Anonymous op ever seen’ after hacking into various Russian news channels including Moscow 24 and Russia 24, as well as streaming sites to share footage of the war.
Sharing footage on Twitter, the collective wrote: "The hacking collective #Anonymous hacked into the Russian streaming services Wink and Ivi (like Netflix) and live TV channels Russia 24, Channel One, Moscow 24 to broadcast war footage from Ukraine [today]."
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At the end of the clip, a message urged Russians to oppose the invasion, stating that 'ordinary Russians are against the war'.
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Topics: Ukraine, Russia, World News