CyberBerkut claims it brought down NATO’s main website (nato.int), as well as the sites of the alliance’s cyber defense center (ccdcoe.org) and NATO's Parliamentary Assembly (nato-pa.int), RT reported on Sunday.
The group, in a message posted on its website, says its members will “not allow the presence of NATO occupation on the territory of our homeland!”
The hackers also claimed that they are countering the action of the so-called “Tallinn cyber center” or NATO Cooperative Cyber Defense Centre of Excellence, which has been hired by the “Kiev junta” to carry out “propaganda among the Ukrainian population through the media and social networking.”
The Western cyber network, hackers claim, is hiding behind the façade of the so-called “Maidan Cyber Sotnya” and helps “blocking objective sources of information and concealing criminal activities of those calling themselves the ‘legitimate authority.’"
NATO has confirmed attacks on its websites via twitter, saying sites suffered from “significant DDoS attack.” No critical systems has been hit and the integrity of NATO systems remains intact, NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said.
Since the coup deposed legitimate authorities in Kiev, CyberBerkut – named after the riot police unit that became an “arch-enemy” of Maidan – has pledged to fight against the stream of “neo-fascist propaganda” from “vicious and corrupt media.”
Cyberattacks from the other side of the barricades have also escalated over the recent weeks as Ukrainian and Western media were spinning the story of a “Russian military invasion” in Ukraine. Cyber activists supporting the Maidan coup were targeting Russian government websites and media.
Just this Friday, unidentified hackers temporarily brought down the Russian presidency’s site and the Central Bank’s web page in a wave of online attacks. “A powerful cyber-attack is underway on the [Kremlin] site,” a Kremlin spokeswoman said, adding they had been unable to discern who had carried out the attack.
The Russian Foreign Ministry’s website also suffered disruptions Friday. They did not rule out that the problems could also be connected with hacker attacks.
NTJ/NJF