Meet The Ukrainian Hackers Targeting The Kremlin's Master Manipulator
As Russia stands accused of meddling with the U.S. election and waging war in the east of Ukraine, Americans, Brits and others have discussed, and threatened, retaliation. In Ukraine, hackers have long been biting back in earnest.
Over the last two weeks, a group of hackers calling themselves The Cyber Alliance claim to have accessed significant tranches of emails linked to Vladislav Surkov, believed to be the mastermind of Russia’s misinformation tactics and one of Putin’s more surreptitious aides. Surkov was, in 2014, placed on a U.S. sanction list for his role in Russia’s dealings in Ukraine. In his recent documentary Hypernormalization, Adam Curtis described Surkov’s ability to create instability by simultaneously spinning contradictory stories, pointing to the West’s befuddlement over Russia’s support of the Syrian regime. Curtis previously called him “a ruthless manipulator of modern politics.”
The Alliance is made up of various groups, going by the names CyberJunta, Falcons Flame, Trinity and RUH8. One of Cyber Alliance’s members, from RUH8, spoke with FORBES over encrypted chat on Thursday morning, shortly after they leaked the contents of an email account they claimed belonged to Maria Vingradova, an assistant to Surkov. To date, the Alliance has claimed breaches of at least two accounts of individuals associated with Surkov. The Kremlin, which hadn’t responded to a request for comment at the time of publication, previously stated Surkov does not use email.
