FREEDOM TV under attack: stream switched to the Russian channel "Za Zhyzn!"

Photo by gazetadita.al

The Ukrainian international broadcasting channel FREEDOM TV reports an interference in the channel's work today, April 17: the channel's satellite signal was blocked and the content was temporarily replaced, writes the channel's website.

The technical services recorded the TV channel's signal being absent from the Hot Bird 13G satellite at 15:06.

"The attack's goal was to replace the FREEDOM TV stream with other content. A broadcast by the channel branded 'Za Zhyzn!' was seen instead of FREEDOM TV," the channel notes.

The broadcast continued uninterrupted on other satellites (in the networks of the cable, IPTV and OTT operators that stream FREEDOM TV), except for those that receive their signal via Hot Bird 13G.

The channel's stream was restored at 15:24.

The state-owned company "International Multimedia Broadcasting Platform of Ukraine" has contacted the Cyber ​​Security Situation Center at the Security Service of Ukraine regarding interference in the work of FREEDOM TV.

The interference in the work of the satellite operator Eutelsat, which owns the Hot Bird 13G satellite, is also being addressed by French law enforcers.

Hot Bird 13G is one of the most powerful and popular satellites, covering Europe (including the European part of Russia), Central Asia, the northern coast of Africa, and the Middle East.

On January 29, two websites of the state-owned "International Multimedia Broadcasting Platform of Ukraine" – those of the FREEDOM TV channel and the FREEDOM digital news aggregator – were subjected to a massive DDoS attack. The company believes that Russian hackers could be behind the incident.

On January 25, the websites of the TV channels "Dim" and "FREEDOM" crashed due to a large-scale cyber attack on a data center.

On the night of March 13, he website of the digital news aggregator FREEDOM (part of the state-owned "International Multimedia Broadcasting Platform of Ukraine") withstood a mass DDoS attack.