France on 29 March formally accused Russian military intelligence of cyber attacks on the country over the past decade, among them interference in President Emmanuel Macron’s election campaign in 2017 and an attack on television network TV5 Monde in 2015. AFP reported that.
“Russia’s military intelligence (GRU) has been conducting cyberattacks against France for several years using the hacking group known as APT28,” Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said on the social network X, marking the first time the game has been officially blamed for the attacks.
In 2017, the Financial Times wrote that Russian Federation had mobilised the hacking group APT28 (other names include Pawn Storm, Fancy Bear, BlueDelta). It is known for its attacks on French television network TV5Monde, private US military company Blackwater, the French and Hungarian Defence Ministries and the US State Department.
Cybersecurity experts in the US, Britain, Israel and Germany already claimed at the time that ART28 was ordered by Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate.
Moscow categorically denies its co-operation with the hackers.