Ukraine and Russia said their emergency alert apps had been hacked overnight, sending false warnings to citizens about impending air raids and chemical and nuclear attacks.
The warnings coincided with the expiry of a six-day local ceasefire brokered by US first lady Melania Trump in a small area of southern Ukraine — the longest such pause in fighting since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
Ukraine’s public air raid app started to send false alerts just before 11 p.m. (2100 GMT) on Sunday for the capital Kyiv and other areas, warning of radiation and chemical attacks and also the risk of street combat in some areas.
Hours later, Russian state news agency TASS quoted the Emergencies Ministry in Moscow as saying that its own mobile app had also been hit by a cyberattack that resulted in fake public warnings being transmitted.
Reuters was unable to verify which groups were responsible. Experts have linked previous cyber security incidents during the almost five-year-old war to activist hackers as well as intelligence agencies on both sides.
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In Ukraine, one of the alarms said Russia had launched a hypersonic Oreshnik missile — which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead — and that a nuclear alert had been declared.
Ukraine’s air force said shortly after on the Telegram messaging app that the alert system appeared to have been hacked by Russia, noting that the alerts were broadcast in Russian. The Ukrainian language is compulsory for all official communications in Ukraine.
“The air alert app appears to have been subjected to enemy influence,” the air force said. “There is no radiation threat! Stay calm and follow our updates on our channel!”
KYIV RESIDENTS UNFAZED BY FALSE ALERTS
All-clear messages were sent shortly afterwards for each alert and Ukraine’s Ministry for Digital Transformation said the app had been temporarily suspended, but other means of alerting the public were functioning, as were air raid sirens.
Ukraine is suffering from a critical lack of air defences, particularly US-made Patriot interceptors that are its only effective defence against Russian ballistic missiles. The US on Friday announced a $2.1 billion deal to supply 500 Patriot interceptors to Ukraine, but two people briefed on the decision said it could take years for the missiles to arrive.
On the streets of Kyiv, residents played down the impact of the hack.
Artem Pyndyk, 37, a businessman, said he was briefly surprised to see the messages but then realised what had happened.
“This didn’t trigger the kind of reaction in society that they expected,” said Pyndyk, adding that family members and friends he had checked in with had also not panicked.
“You can laugh about it but, on the other hand, they gained a certain level of access and were able to hack the programme.”
Oksana Vostrykova, 48, also shrugged off the incident.
“I am calm about it, I kind of immediately understood that it might be a false message,” the pizzeria employee said. “You worry more not for yourself but for your children who are nearby.”
RUSSIAN MINISTRY SAYS ITS APP WAS ALSO HIT
Atesh, a pro-Ukrainian hacking group, posted a screenshot of the alert message seen in Russia on its Telegram channel early on Monday, with a message saying: “The Ministry of Emergency Situations app has been hacked!”
However, the Moscow ministry played down the impact, saying the app was not one of its main public warning system channels, but just what it called a supplementary source of information.
A fake message posted by the hackers, seen by Reuters, did not attempt to mimic an official communication and was laced with colloquialisms, profanities and derogatory language about Russia, calling its regions “swamps”.
The fake message told Russians that nuclear warheads had been launched against all Russian regions and advised people to stock up on three weeks of food and shelter in their cellars.
The Russian ministry said its experts were working to restore the app to normal operation.
“We ask the public to remain calm and to trust only official sources of information — the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations’ website and the department’s official social media accounts,” it says.
