By Euronews
Published on
Pro-Russian hacking group Noname057(16) claimed responsibility for a cyberattack that disrupted France’s national postal service during the Christmas rush, French prosecutors said Wednesday.
French intelligence agency DGSI took over the investigation after the group’s claim, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.
La Poste’s central computer systems were knocked offline Monday in a distributed denial of service attack that remained unresolved by Wednesday morning.
Postal workers could not track package deliveries, and online payments at the company’s banking arm La Banque Postale were disrupted.
The attack hit during the busiest season for La Poste, which employs more than 200,000 people.
Noname057(16) has previously targeted Ukrainian media websites and government and corporate sites in countries including Poland, Sweden and Germany.
The group was subject of Operation Eastwood, a coordinated international police operation in July that involved authorities from 12 countries.
During that operation, police dismantled over 100 servers worldwide, made two arrests in France and Spain, and issued seven arrest warrants, including six for Russian nationals. However, the group resumed operations within days and has remained active.
The group has previously attacked French government sites, including the Ministry of Justice and several prefectures and cities.
Moscow’s acts of sabotage as widespread as terrorism?
The disruption came days after France’s government said it suffered a cyberattack that affected the Interior Ministry, which oversees national security.
In that breach, a suspected hacker extracted several dozen sensitive documents and gained access to information on police records and wanted individuals, Interior Minister Laurent Nunez told broadcaster Franceinfo.
Last week, prosecutors said France’s counterintelligence agency is investigating a suspected cyberattack plot involving software that would have enabled remote control of computer systems on an international passenger ferry.
A Latvian crew member is being held on charges of acting for an unidentified foreign power, officials said.
Nunez strongly hinted at Russian involvement, saying “foreign interference very often comes from same country,” though no official attribution has been made.
France and other European allies of Ukraine say Russia is waging a campaign of “hybrid warfare” through sabotage, assassinations, cyberattacks and disinformation to sow division in Western societies and undermine support for Ukraine.
On sabotage alone, scores of incidents have been identified across Europe since Russia’s full-scale invasion of February 2022 that Western officials attribute to Moscow, including arson attacks on warehouses, railway sabotage and vandalism.
European intelligence agencies say investigations into Russian interference now consume as much time as terrorist threats.
Video editor • Malek Fouda
Additional sources • AP