Pro-Navalny Hackers Breach Russian Prison Computers, Lower Commissary Prices
Hours after Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny died in prison on February 16, 2024, anti-government hackers took revenge, breaching information systems of the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) and posting personal data of some 800,000 prisoners online. Prices at prison system commissaries were also altered, lowering items that had retailed for the equivalent of $1 USD to about one cent.
As PLN reported, Navalny died serving a lengthy sentence for convictions related to his opposition to Russian Pres. Vladmir Putin. Navalny had previously left the country after being attacked in 2017 with a chemical agent, only to be poisoned again with the Novochik nerve agent in 2020. He then returned to Russia and continued challenging Putin, for which he was sentenced and imprisoned. [See: PLN, Apr. 2024, p.39.]
FSIN’s commissary subsidiary, JSC Kaluzhskoe, acknowledged the “technical failure” on February 19, 2024, but it took another three days for most altered prices to be changed back.
“We were watching the [online data from the commissary] and it just kept scrolling faster and faster with more and more customers making purchases,” one unnamed hacker said.
The “hackitivists” behind the data breach and price changes called themselves expatriates who promised to continue until Russia “is free from the Putin regime.” FSIN had not commented about the incident as of April 1, 2024.
Source: CNN
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