False warnings of major attacks as emergency apps in Russia and Ukraine hacked

Russia and Ukraine say both country’s emergency alert apps have been hit by cyberattacks in separate incidents, leading to false warnings of nuclear strikes and hazards in each nation.

As the war between the two continues after a brief ceasefire ended, alerts on Ukraine’s emergency warning app reportedly showed the capital Kyiv was under attack, while Russia’s system later falsely warned of strikes on its own soil.

Ukraine’s Air Force said the public air raid alert app had been hacked.

The app for a short time showed Kyiv and other areas subject to nuclear and chemical alerts and the threat of street combat.

An erroneous message said Russia's hypersonic Oreshnik missile had been deployed.

“The air alert app appears to have been subjected to enemy influence,” the air force said on Telegram.

“There is no radiation threat! Stay calm and follow our updates on our channel!”

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The abnormality later disappeared.

Ukraine's Ministry for Digital Transformation said the app was not in operation, but other means of alerting the public were functioning as were air raid sirens.

In a separate event, the mobile app of Russia’s emergencies ministry was hit by a massive cyberattack that resulted in the spread of false information to the public, state news agency TASS quoted the ministry as saying.

It was not immediately clear whether the two incidents were linked.

– with Reuters