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The Russia-aligned cyber threat actor<\/a> known as NoName057 (16) has reportedly announced that it is launching large-scale distributed denial of service<\/a> (DDoS) attacks targeting internet infrastructure throughout Europe.<\/p>\n The group is notorious for orchestrating Project DDoSia, a campaign that conducts massive DDoS attacks against entities supportive of Ukraine<\/a>, mainly targeting NATO countries.<\/p>\n During the current European election season, the hackers declared their intention to disrupt these events with DDoS attacks. The election period began on June 6, in the Netherlands, while Estonia started its voting process on June 3. Both Czechia and Ireland are casting their votes on Friday (June 7), with other EU member states scheduled to vote over the upcoming weekend.<\/p>\n According to cyber security news website DailyDarkWeb<\/a>, the group criticized the European Parliament as a \u201cpseudo-democratic and thoroughly Russophobic body.\u201d NoName057(16) accused the European Parliament of implementing \u201cmeaningless anti-Russian sanctions\u201d following Russia\u2019s actions in Crimea in 2014 and Donbas in 2022. In response to what they perceive as \u201cRussophobia\u201d and the double standards of European authorities, the group announced that Europe\u2019s internet infrastructure would be targeted by Russian hackers.<\/p>\n It said<\/a> on the social media site Telegram: \u201cWhen Russia began protecting the peaceful population of Crimea in 2014 and the residents of Donbas in 2022, the EP [European Parliament], like a rabid printer, started issuing meaningless anti-Russian sanctions in bulk.<\/p>\n \u201cFor the Russophobia and double standards of European authorities, Europe\u2019s internet infrastructure will suffer from Russian hackers.\u201d<\/p>\n NoName057(16) claims that it has recruited several other malicious hacking groups to its cause, such as 22C, IAMKILLMILK, CoupTeam, Cyberdragon, People\u2019s CyberArmy, Root@kali, and Usersec. This is in addition to other participants who wish to remain anonymous.<\/p>\n In a blog post<\/a>, Cloudflare\u2019s Jo\u00e3o Tom\u00e9 said that the firm had already observed \u201csignificant\u201d DDoS attacks targeting multiple election or politically-related Internet properties in the Netherlands. He added: \u201cOn June 5 and 6, 2024, Cloudflare systems automatically detected and mitigated DDoS attacks that targeted at least three politically-related Dutch websites.\u201d On June 5, Cloudflare said it had mitigated one billion HTTP requests from daily DDoS attacks in the Netherlands.<\/p>\n The primary DDoS attack on June 5 targeted a specific website, peaking at 14:13 UTC (16:13 local time) with a rate of 73,000 requests per second. This attack persisted for several hours.<\/p>\n The security firm attributes these attacks to the pro-Russian hacker group HackNeT, which has claimed responsibility. Writing on Telegram, a group purporting to be HackNeT, said<\/a>: \u201cThe Netherlands is the first country to vote for a new European Parliament.<\/p>\n \u201cSo they\u2019ll be the first to suffer from DDoS attacks.\u201d<\/p>\n The center-right Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), Geert Wilders\u2019 far-right Party for Freedom (PVV), and the populist, far-right Forum for Democracy (FvD) all encountered issues with their websites.<\/p>\n Vanochtend was de CDA-website door een zware DDOS-aanval tijdelijk minder bereikbaar.<\/p>\n Op verkiezingsdag beschouwen we dit als een aanval op vrije, democratische verkiezingen. We maken melding bij de relevante instanties. Onze website is inmiddels weer bereikbaar.\u00a0#VerkiezingenEU<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 CDA (@cdavandaag) June 6, 2024<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The CDA announced on X that its website was subjected to a \u201cheavy\u201d distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. \u201cOn election day, we consider this to be an attack on free, democratic elections,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, another security analyst under the username CyberKnow stated that the group Cyber Army Russia Reborn also launched DDoS attacks targeting Ireland.<\/p>\n Cyber Army Russia Reborn as part of the DDoS attacks against the European elections has targeted Ireland. In what be one of the first pro-Russian hacktivist attacks on Ireland since 2022#cybersecurity<\/a> #infosec<\/a> #Europe<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/ah5b6VivfP<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 CyberKnow (@Cyberknow20) June 7, 2024<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n #Spain<\/a> \ud83c\uddea\ud83c\uddf8 \u2013 NoName057(16) allegedly carried out a #DDoS<\/a> attack on Santa B\u00e1rbara Sistemas, a Spanish defense contractor based in Madrid.#DarkWeb<\/a> #cyberattack<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/KuZfPYFcQR<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Dark Web Intelligence (@DailyDarkWeb) June 6, 2024<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n DailyDarkWeb also reported that NoName057(16) allegedly carried out a DDoS attack on Santa B\u00e1rbara Sistemas, a Spanish defense contractor based in Madrid.<\/p>\n Featured image: Ideogram<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nWhy are hacker groups targeting European elections with DDoS attacks?<\/h2>\n
Dutch party websites attacked<\/h2>\n
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Other European nations in firing line<\/h2>\n
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