Within hours of Alexey Navalny 's death in February in a Russian prison, hackers sought revenge by breaching systems and stealing a database. prison
The hackers used their access to a computer network connected to Russia's prison system and began posting a photo of Navalny on the prison website.
“Long live Alexey Navalny!” read a message on the hacked website, accompanied by a photo of Navalny and his wife Yulia from a political rally.
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According to the hackers' claims, a database containing information on hundreds of thousands of Russian prisoners and their relatives and contacts was also stolen.
The hackers, who say they are a mix of nationalities, including Russian expatriates and Ukrainians, are sharing this data, including phone numbers and email addresses of detainees and their relatives "in the hope that someone can contact them and help figure out what happened to Navalny," one of the hackers told CNN.
Additionally, the hackers used access to the prison store, where family members buy food for prisoners, to change the prices of items such as pasta and canned goods.
It took several hours for the administrator of the prison online store to notice that Russians were buying food at much lower prices, and it took three days to restore the original prices.
"We were monitoring the access logs to the online store and it just kept moving faster and faster with more and more customers making purchases," the hacker told CNN.
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The hackers claim that the database contains information on approximately 800,000 prisoners and their relatives. Although there appear to be some duplicate entries in the database, hundreds of thousands of people are certainly affected.
On February 19, the day after hackers breached the prison website and posted Alexey Navalny's photo, JSC Kaluzhskoe (owner of the food store that was breached) posted on the Russian social networking platform VK that it had suffered a "technical failure" that led to incorrect prices.
A security expert with experience in database analysis said the leaked data appeared authentic and came from the compromised prison store.
It is also said that the hackers asked the administrators of the prison online store not to remove the messages in favor of Navalny from the site. When the administrators refused, the hackers retaliated by destroying one of the administrators' computer servers.
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Navalny, an opposition political leader, died under mysterious circumstances on February 16 in a prison in the Yamalo-Nenets region, 1,200 miles northeast of Moscow. The United States holds Russian President Vladimir Putin responsible for Navalny's death.
This attack had significant implications for Russia's data security. First, it exposed the shortcomings in the data security of the country's prisons, as hackers were able to breach security and steal sensitive information.
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Second, the attack jeopardized the personal security of prisoners, as their personal data could be used by third parties for malicious actions.
Third, the attack raised doubts about Russia's ability to protect its citizens' data, which could have implications for public trust in government authorities.
Finally, the attack could lead to increased pressure to strengthen data security measures in Russia, which could have implications for the country's budget.
Source: edition.cnn.com
