WORLDTECHHackers claim breach of Rosstat, Russia's state statistics agency
Hackers say they broke into Rosstat, Russia's state statistics agency, and pulled 23TB of data, including casualty figures tied to the war in Ukraine. Rosstat has acknowledged suspicious activity but rejects the claim that protected information was leaked.
What the attackers say they took
The Belarusian CyberPartisans and Silent Crow groups have claimed responsibility for the intrusion. According to the attackers, they removed 23TB of material, among it internal document management systems and figures on losses linked to the conflict in Ukraine.
The same hackers put Russian military losses at 1,584,910 personnel, together with 587,409 unmanned aerial vehicles lost. They further assert that they reached the agency's central and regional IT infrastructure, including domain controllers and virtualisation systems.
Rosstat's account and what remains unverified
Rosstat says it noticed suspicious activity over the Halloween weekend, but insists its infrastructure kept working and that no protected information escaped.
Official Russian sources have not confirmed the casualty numbers the hackers published. Tech Radar, which first reported the incident, describes it as a significant breach that exposed sensitive military information, yet that description relies on the hackers' assertions and on a single outlet's reporting.
Wider concern over federal data security
The episode points to continuing weaknesses in federal departments when it comes to protecting sensitive national data sets. Cybersecurity experts and law enforcement agencies are now examining the incident to establish how the attackers got in and how far they reached.
Open questions
- Which attack vector was used to reach Rosstat's systems?
- Is the data the hackers claim to hold authentic, and how much of it was actually taken?