Russian postal operator disrupted by Ukrainian hacktivists

Donbas Post, a Russian state-owned postal operator servicing the annexed Ukrainian territories of Donetsk and Luhansk, has confirmed having its corporate network, email systems, and web platform knocked down following an attack claimed by the hacktivist operation Ukrainian Cyber Alliance, reports The Record, a news site by cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.

Over 1,000 workstations and nearly 100 virtual machines, as well as dozens of terabytes of data, were allegedly wiped by the UCA as a result of the intrusion, which occurred at the same time as a Ukrainian drone strike against the occupied region's energy infrastructure last week.

Such a development comes amid persistent hacktivist and state-sponsored cyberattacks against Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories, with Donetsk, Luhansk, and Crimea agriculture, government, and transport entities reported by Kaspersky Lab researchers to have been targeted with novel surveillance malware two years ago. High-profile organizations in the said regions have also been subjected to Cloud Atlas cyberespionage attacks.