Italian airports, foreign ministry targeted in cyberattack by pro-Russia group

A pro-Russia hacking group Saturday (Dec 28) claimed responsibility for a cyberattack targeting at least ten official websites in Italy, including those belonging to the foreign ministry and two airports in Milan city. The group, named Noname057(16), in a statement on Telegram said Italy’s ‘Russophobes’ got a “well deserved cyber response”.

Earlier, Italy’s cyber security agency said that the attack left the targeted websites out of service for some time. A spokesperson for the agency said Russia-backed hackers deployed the so-called "Distributed Denial of Service" (DDoS) attack. DDoS involves feeding a network with massive amounts of data traffic in less time which ends up paralysing it.

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The agency added that it quickly offered assistance to targeted websites and mitigated the overall affect within two hours.

A company that manages Milan's Linate and Malpensa airports in a statement said that the cyber attack caused no flight disruptions on any of the airports. It said the travellers could still use the mobile application to access necessary services.

625% increase in cyber attacks

Earlier this year, Italy’s National Cybersecurity Agency reported a staggering 625 per cent increase in DDoS-type cyber attacks compared to the previous year. According to a report by Financial Times, the NoName057(16) group was also involved in targeting key Italian institutions in 2024, including Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s website and those of the Ministries of Infrastructure and Enterprise.

Some of the attacks were launched by pro-Russia groups when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Rome. “After he landed at Ciampino, an attack on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website began,” said Deputy PM and Foreign Affairs Minister Antonio Tajani. Some of the attacks came in response to the military aid announced by Rome for Kyiv.

(With inputs from agencies)