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Incident I00244: Hackers publish fake story about Ukrainians attempting to assassinate Slovak president

  • Summary: An unidentified attacker hacked a Czech news service's website and published a fake story on Tuesday claiming that an assassination attempt had been made against the newly elected Slovak president, Peter Pellegrini.

  • incident type:

  • Year started:

  • Countries: ,

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  • Date added:

Reference Pub Date Authors Org Archive
https://therecord.media/hackers-breach-news-website-false-article-slovakia-assassination 2024-04-24 00:00:00 Alexander Martin The Record https://archive.is/9tgHc
Technique Description given for this incident
T0152.004 Website Asset An unidentified attacker hacked a Czech news service's website and published a fake story on Tuesday claiming that an assassination attempt had been made against the newly elected Slovak president, Peter Pellegrini (T0152.004: Website Asset, T0150.005: Compromised Asset, T0097.202: News Outlet Persona, T0145.005: Compromised Persona, T0161.002: Statement Incorrectly Presented as Made by Individual or Institution).

According to the government-owned public service Czech News Agency (CTK), the attacker posted the false article directly to its website, meaning the story was not distributed to the service’s clients.

The article has since been retracted, with CTK declaring it to be a fake and announcing that it had informed the country’s intelligence agencies and cybersecurity authority about the breach.

The headline of the fake story claimed that Slovakia’s domestic intelligence agency, the Security Information Service (BIS), “prevented an assassination attempt on the newly elected Slovak President Petr Pelligrini.”

Readers noted that the story misspelled Peter Pellegrini’s name.

Pellegrini was elected earlier this month (T0068: Respond to Breaking News Event or Active Crisis), providing what Reuters reported was a boost to Slovakia’s pro-Russian prime minister Robert Fico. Despite Slovakia’s NATO membership, Pellegrini has said he would oppose sending the country’s armed forces to assist a member state if it were attacked by Russia.

The false story published on Tuesday in both Czech and English said that the fictitious attempted assassination of Pellegrini was planned by Ukrainian nationals. It named Vitaliy Usatyy, Kyiv’s charge d’affaires in Prague, as one of the perpetrators.

CTK described the incident as an act of disinformation. No evidence has yet been published tying the hack to a particular actor, and the news agency said it would not be releasing further information.

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