After sales of a postage stamp portraying a Ukrainian soldier making an obscene gesture to a Russian cruiser went online, Ukraine’s national postal office, Ukrposhta, announced it had been struck by a hack on Friday.
Following the sinking of Russia’s Black Sea fleet flagship, lines formed to acquire the stamp when it went on sale at the postal headquarters in Kyiv last week. Kyiv claimed to have fired missiles at the warship Moskva. The ship sank while being pulled in rough seas, according to Russia, after a fire triggered by an ammo explosion.
Ukrposhta’s director general, Ihor Smilianskyi, apologized to clients for a DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) assault but did not disclose who was responsible.
“We are doing everything we can, working with internet providers, to restore both the online shop and other Ukrposhta services that are now down due to a DDoS assault on our systems,” he posted on Facebook.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, Ukrainian officials have warned of the threat of cyber assaults by Russian hackers. Moscow has refuted charges that it has undertaken cyberattacks against Ukraine on several occasions.
Ukraine said earlier this month that it had prevented a cyberattack by Russian hackers aimed at causing harm to its energy supply.
Russia began building up army forces along its border with Ukraine in April 2021. Russian President Vladimir Putin dispatched armed soldiers into the separatist Ukrainian republics of Donetsk and Luhansk on February 22, 2022, describing the operation as a “peacekeeping mission.” Putin also declared Donetsk and Luhansk to be sovereign entities, completely apart from the Ukrainian government.
Putin declared a “special military operation” to “demilitarize and denazify” Ukraine in the early hours of February 24, 2022, and started a large-scale invasion of the nation. Later that day, the Ukrainian authorities stated that Chernobyl had been taken over by Russia. In reaction to the invasion, Ukraine requested quick membership to the European Union on February 28, 2022.
One month following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it became clear that Russia’s early forecasts of a swift triumph in Ukraine were based on erroneous Russian information. With Ukrainian counter-offensives pushing Russian front lines back around Kyiv, Russia had not yet achieved its two key original objectives, the takeover of Ukraine’s two largest cities, Kyiv and Kharkiv. A chronically under-trained Russian army, as well as a lack of proper Russian equipment, food, and armament, were reported in several publications.
