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Polish government cyberattack blamed on Russia

Round up the usual suspects

A largely unsuccessful attack on Polish government systems last month reportedly originated in Russia.

Details are scarce but it seemed that the attack coincided with the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War Two. Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita reported that the assault targeted Polish government systems and took place at the same time Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited Poland.

Pawel Bialek, deputy head of Poland's Internal Security Agency (ABW), said it was able to thwart the attack, without going into details, Infowar Monitor reports.

Rzeczpospolita's original report can be found here (English language translation via Google here).

Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union infamously invaded and carved up Poland in September 1939 under the secret terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop non-aggression pact. Polish hackers attacking Russia might make sense in the context of the anniversary of infamous invasion; it's harder to understand why Russian hackers might have it in for Poland, but then again perhaps they don't need much provocation before cracking open the attack tools.

Disputes between Russia and its neighbours have regularly spilled out onto the internet over recent years. For example, cyberattacks accompanied the armed conflict between Russia and Georgia over the fate of Russian-language speaking regions of Georgia last year. Security researchers subsequently blamed the attacks on civilians and Russian cyber-crime gangs.

The internet infrastructure of Estonia was ripped apart in April 2007, following a dispute over the relocation of Soviet-era war memorials and graves. ®

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