A group of Belarusian hackers has compromised the account of some Ukrainian militarythen post bogus videos in they declared surrender after the Russian invasion. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, reported the hacker group and blocked their activity.
A group of hackers pretend to be Ukrainian soldiers to declare surrender
In the past, researchers had called them “Ghostwriters”. They are a group of Belarusian hackers that Meta in her report defines UNC1151 and that the security company Mandiant allegedly linked directly to the Belarusian government, an ally of Moscow during the invasion of Ukraine.
During the February update for safety Meta had already reported problems with the group. But after the update the hackers have been able to find new methods for log into dozens of accounts of Ukrainian military personnel to declare surrender on their behalf.
However, Meta assures that it blocked the videos created by the hackers before they could spread and deliver bogus messages to the population and other Ukrainian resistance forces. In fact, although it is easy to disprove these fake ads, experts think these tactics serve to reduce Ukrainians’ confidence in the media. Removing them from the institutions and disuniting the country.
It is not the first time that Facebook has had to deal with this type of problem (even before it changed its name to Meta). The Russian and Belarusian hacker campaigns for discredit the media and spread fake news unfortunately they are not new. But now the use becomes surgical to hit Ukraine. Flooding her with false information so that the truth cannot be found. And therefore the strength to resist.
But Meta’s intervention should have stopped these new attacks. We will keep you updated on the story.