Russia’s second-largest bank VTB Bank under DDoS attack

Russia’s second-largest bank VTB Bank reveals it is facing the largest DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack in its history.

State-owned VTB Bank, the second-largest financial institution in Russia, says it is facing the largest DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack in its history.

The pro-Ukraine collective IT Army of Ukraine has claimed responsibility for the DDoS attacks against the bank. In November the group of hacktivists announced the offensive on its Telegram channel.

The attack is causing problems for its customers that are not able to access the website of the bank and its mobile app. The bank added that customers’ data were not compromised as a result of the attack.

“The bank’s technological infrastructure is under an unprecedented cyber attack from abroad,” reads a statement issued by the Russian bank. “The largest not only this year, but in the whole time the bank has operated.”

The cyber attacks against the infrastructure of government and private Russian entities spiked after the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine.

Most of the attacks are conducted by hacktivists supporting Ukraine, while Pro-Russia groups like the Killnet collective are targeting organizations and governments worldwide that offered support to Kyiv.

VTB confirmed that despite most of the malicious traffic coming from abroad, the attacks also originated from Russian IP addresses. The financial institution reported the Russian IP addresses to law enforcement to take over them.

Other Russian banks, including the Central Bank of Russia and Alfa Bank were hit by cyber attacks in the last weeks.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, VTB Bank)

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