Russian hackers attack Odesa Online, post anti-Ukraine illustrations

Russian hackers attacked the website Odesa Online on the night of August 23, the editor-in-chief Vitalina Pukhyr reported in a comment to the Institute of Mass Information representative in Odesa oblast.

According to her, the hackers edited several posts on the website, inserting illustrations with anti-Ukraine messages.

Vitalina Pukhyr says that in the first months of the full-scale invasion, the media outlet's website repeatedly went offline due to Russia's mass hacks. However, the editors installed new enhanced safeguards and has managed until now despite the continuing DDoS attacks on the website and attempts to hack the admin system.

Russian hackers attacked Odesa Online to post illustrations with anti-Ukraine messaging. Photo by Vitalina Pukhyr

"Unfortunately, tonight they succeeded, hacking one of our employees' accounts and editing several posts where they inserted pictures with anti-Ukraine messaging. There was also a link to the Telegram channel of a Russian hacker group engaged in anti-Ukraine operations," said the editor-in-chief.

She added that the technicians responded to the attack promptly and quickly resolved the issue.

"Right now the website is working as usual, all posts have been restored. I believe the Russian hackers's activity has to do with dates that are important for our country: the National Flag Day and Independence Day," says Vitalina Pukhyr.

Earlier, Ukrinform reported a hacker attack on their website. The website was receiving over 200 thousand requests per second, which resulted in some visitors having problems accessing the website. However, the attack was repelled. The news agency's CEO Serhiy Cherevaty noted that they had grounds to believe that Russian hackers were likely involved in the attack.