IMI receives bomb threats again

Illustration by the IMI

The Institute of Mass Information (IMI) received an email on February 20 claiming that a bomb had been planted in the IMI office building.

The letter came from a user signed Serhiy Ivanovich Boyko at the email address [email protected].

“Today your building will explode, and your loved ones will be picking you up piece by piece. Because it was I who took it upon myself to destroy biowaste,” the sender writes.

They asked to take their email seriously and added that their devices contain a total of about 13 kilograms of explosives with striking elements that “will cause maximum damage to everyone nearby.”

The sender listed nine more locations in different cities of Ukraine where, as they claim, “explosions will go off today.”

The letter contains hate speech, and the sender mentions that they “always loved to kill,” that they have tortured animals, and also murdered their own parents.

The IMI first received an email about a "bomb threat" on January 31, 2025. The anonymous sender threatened to blow up an unspecified building. The writing suggested that the author was probably not fluent in Ukrainian.

The Russians continued to intimidate journalists and mass mail threats to them in 2024. The IMI recorded three waves (in October, November, and December) of anonymous emails claiming that bombs had been planted in various media offices and other facilities across Ukraine: identical emails were received by many media outlets and journalists. This trend continues in 2025.