Authorities and government institutions in Montenegro are currently under a massive cyber attack, their websites are mostly unavailable. This is reported by the National Security Agency (ANB) of the Western Balkan country. The ANB announced on Friday that Russian hackers would paralyze government and agency services in a large-scale and coordinated attack. According to the ANB, Montenegro is “in a hybrid war”. ABC News reported on it.

Cyber ​​attacks could partially paralyze the country’s infrastructure

Accordingly, the ANB was able to observe the first attacks in the course of this week, they were aimed at the government’s IT infrastructure and were partially repelled. Later, however, the attacks became more widespread and spread to more government targets, writes abc News. The ANB is certain that Russian authorities are behind the attack. Such coordinated attacks on Montenegro are taking place for the first time and have been prepared for a long time, abc News quoted a statement from the ANB as saying. A government official also pointed out that Russia was “certainly” behind the attacks.

The attacks appear to be so widespread and serious that they could disrupt public order in Montenegro. The US Embassy issued a warning to all US citizens in the country that the ongoing cyberattacks could cripple supplies, traffic including border stations and flights, and telecommunications.

The former Yugoslav state on the Adriatic coast declared independence from Serbia in 2006 and joined NATO in 2017 – much to the displeasure of Russia, which immediately responded with sanctions. Up to this point, Montenegro was Russia’s last strategic ally of the Western Balkans on the Adriatic coast; only Serbia did not support the sanctions against Russia and continues to stand by Russia. After the Russian army invaded Ukraine, Montenegro joined Western sanctions against Russia and promptly ended up on Moscow’s list of “enemy states”.

(tw)