The pro-Russian group ‘Killnet’ tried to carry out cyberattacks during the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday night, Italian police reveal.
Tens of millions of people across Europe enjoyed (or didn’t for that matter) the performances of the 25 finalists of the Eurovision 2022 song contest, which saw the plebiscite of Ukraine by the public, after 3:30 a.m. live on television. But since Turin, everything has not been rosy behind the scenes, since the organization has had to rule out several computer attack attempts, attributed to the pro-Russian group Killnet.
Attacks repelled by ANSSI and Italian police
On Saturday evening, the Ukrainian rap group Kalush won Eurovision with a total of 631 points, generating a record of points with the public, which made their success against European juries.
But the day after the contest, Italian police informed the world that hackers had “ tried to infiltrate in the network of the organization of the competition, in an attempt to disrupt both the performances of the artists and the votes later in the evening.
The Italian police also indicate that they were able to neutralize and repel the attacks thanks to the activation, by the National Center for the Fight against Cybercrime (CNAIPIC, or local ANSSI) and the Italian police, of a ” operations room dedicated to the event upstream of the latter, which operated continuously.
Telegram channels monitored by the police to anticipate attacks and locate hackers
Italian police confirmed to the Reuters news agency that the cyberattacks contained came from the hacker group Killnet and its affiliate Legion, backers of Russia. The group Killnet recently made headlines for having, at the start of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, declared war on the collective Anonymous.
To counter the computer attacks, the Italian police managed to collect information on the Telegram channels of the pro-Russian group to precisely anticipate these critical events and try to locate the geographical origin of the attacks.
Killnet had, a few days before Eurovision, also claimed from Telegram attacks against various Italian institutions, such as the Senate. The evening of May 14, however, did not seem to suffer from any disturbances behind the screen, even if several delegations were unable to announce themselves the points awarded during this final, which at the same time fuels suspicions of manipulated votes. It’s a story.
Source : Reuters
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