Ukraine war: Anonymous collective take down THREE Russian news agency websites after attacking RT
The fightback against Putin’s propaganda machine BEGINS: ‘IT army’ hack THREE state news agencies and target Kremlin website after Russia painted Ukrainian troops as ‘Nazis’ and Moscow banned its media from calling attack an ‘assault, invasion or war’
Anonymous collective have taken down three Russian news agency websites Error messages appeared on TASS, Fontanka and Kommersant on MondayMessage when trying to access Fontanka urged citizens to ‘stop this madness’It comes after Anonymous declared ‘cyber war’ against Putin’s government
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Anonymous have targeted three Russian state news agencies and taken down the Kremlin website after Russia painted Ukrainian troops as ‘Nazis’.
The elusive computer experts have taken down three Russian news agency websites after attacking Kremlin-backed channel RT.
Anonymous declared ‘cyber war’ against Vladimir Putin‘s government on Thursday after he mounted a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Moscow has been accused of producing Hollywood-style ‘fake news’ videos to inflame tensions with Ukraine
When MailOnline tried to access Fontanka on Monday morning, a message signed by Anonymous urges citizens to ‘stop this madness’ and says Vladimir Putin has ‘put us in danger’.
The message claims they will be ‘fired’ or ‘jailed’ for their actions but adds that they ‘can’t take it anymore’.
When trying to access Fontanka, a message reads: ‘Dear citizens. We urge you to stop this madness, do not send your sons and husbands to certain death’
When MailOnline attempted to access Kommersant’s website on Monday morning, a message appeared saying ‘the site can’t be reached’
It reads: ‘Dear citizens. We urge you to stop this madness, do not send your sons and husbands to certain death. Putin makes us lie and puts us in danger.
‘We were isolated from the whole world, they stopped buying oil and gas. In a few years we will live like in North Korea.
‘What is it for us? To put Putin in the textbooks? This is not our war, let’s stop it!
‘This message will be deleted, and some of us will be fired or even jailed. But we can’t take it anymore.
‘Indifferent journalists of Russia.’
When MailOnline attempted to access Kommersant’s website on Monday morning, a message appeared saying ‘the site can’t be reached’.
A similar message appeared on TASS’s website, which said ‘an error occurred’.
A similar error message appeared when trying to access TASS’s website on Monday morning
It comes after Anonymous declared ‘cyber war’ against Vladimir Putin’s (pictured) government after he mounted a full-scale invasion of Ukraine
It added: ‘Sorry the page you are looking for is currently unavailable. Please try again later.’
Some Russian websites have been criticised for being part of a media offensive from the Kremlin in which Ukraine’s fighters are painted as Nazis and Russia is viewed as a liberating force.
The propaganda has led many Russians to be convinced that the conflict was provoked by the West.
It comes after Anonymous announced on Twitter on Thursday evening that it was declaring declared ‘cyber war’ against Putin’s government.
They said shortly before 10pm: ‘The Anonymous collective is officially in cyber war against the Russian government.’
Websites have been criticised for being part of a media offensive from the Kremlin in which Ukraine’s fighters are painted as Nazis and Russia is viewed as a liberating force
Around 30 minutes later, they announced that they had taken down the website of the Kremlin-backed TV channel RT, which broadcasts in Britain and has been heavily criticised for its coverage.
When MailOnline attempted to access the RT site on Friday morning, it was still inaccessible and only displayed an error message that said ‘this site can’t be reached’.
On Monday, the website was back up and running.
The cyber war declaration raises the prospect that Russia could be subjected to more systematic hacking attempts.
Prior to the invasion of Ukraine on Thursday, the country’s government and banks were targeted by a massive cyber attack that was believed to have been carried out by Russia.
People on social media responded positively to Anonymous’s cyber war declaration against Putin.
On Thursday evening, Anonymous said shortly before 10pm: ‘The Anonymous collective is officially in cyber war against the Russian government’
The elusive computer experts issued the stark announcement on their Twitter account on Thursday evening
One person wrote: ‘THANK YOU! Now, work on draining their finances.’
Another said: ‘You are awesome, thanks.’
A third wrote: ‘THANK YOU! I love you! The most beautiful thing EVER…’
Anonymous said in their tweet about RT: ‘The #Anonymous collective has taken down the website of the #Russian propaganda station RT News.’
Anonymous have previously targeted groups including the Ku Klux Klan and Islamic extremists.
Members are known as ‘Anons’ and are distinguished by their Guy Fawkes masks.
In July last year, the collective warned Tesla founder Elon Musk that they planned to target him after saying he wields too much power over the cryptocurrency markets.
The group also announced that they had taken down the website of the Kremlin-backed TV channel RT, which broadcasts in Britain and has been heavily criticised for its coverage
When MailOnline attempted to access the RT site this morning, it was still inaccessible and only displayed an error message that said ‘this site can’t be reached’
Elsewhere, the cyber security team at Meta – parent of Facebook and Instagram – blocked a set of pro-Russian fake accounts and hacked social media profiles that were part of a scheme to undermine Ukraine, the tech giant said on Sunday.
The accounts were conducting a campaign of misinformation, pushing content supporting Russian activities and painting Ukraine as a pawn of the West, according to a Meta statement.
‘They ran websites posing as independent news entities and created fake personas across social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Telegram and also Odnoklassniki and VK (Russian social media networks),’ Meta said in a blog post.
In some cases, ‘they used profile pictures that we believe were likely generated using artificial intelligence techniques’.
The small network of Facebook and Instagram accounts targeted people in Ukraine, using posts to try to get people to visit websites featuring bogus news about the country’s effort to defend itself from the invasion by Russia.
