Air War: Pro-Ukraine Hackers Increasingly Breaking Into Russian Broadcasts With Anti-Kremlin Messages

Radio and TV audiences in several Russian regions on June 5 were startled to hear the familiar voice of President Vladimir Putin announcing a major "invasion" of Russian territory by Ukrainian forces, the imposition of martial law, and a total military mobilization.

Officials and state-controlled media quickly scrambled to denounce the broadcast as a fake, probably created using artificial intelligence, or AI. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was forced to make a statement denying the announcement.

It remains unclear who was responsible for the hack.

Together with drone attacks that at times have reached deep inside Russia and paramilitary raids targeting settlements near its border with Ukraine, such hacks of Russian media are bringing the once-distant war home to ordinary Russians.

"Hacker attacks on radio stations are one more way of getting out information, one more way of showing that it is not only the everyday lives of Ukrainians but of Russians, as well, that can be divided into before and after the invasion," said a member of the Anti-War Committee of Kuban, an underground regional anti-war group active in southern Russia, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. "Such hacking attacks, like the drone attacks, let people understand there is a war going on."

Air Raid

On the country's June 12 Russia Day national holiday, radio stations in the Stavropol and Krasnodar regions, southeast of Ukraine, broadcast air-raid sirens and warnings to seek shelter in the face of an incoming rocket attack.

According to social media reports, the false alarm was heard on stations as far from the front as Ufa and Kazan -- cities hundreds of kilometers from Ukraine -- and the Moscow region. The Telegram channel Mash reported that hackers had managed to break into the central server of a radio network that broadcasts by satellite around the country.

Such hijacking of terrestrial and Internet broadcasting has become increasingly common in recent months, particularly targeting Russia's southern and western regions closest to the border with Ukraine but also ranging farther afield.

"Such interference by enemies in the broadcasts of radio stations has happened in the Stavropol and Belgorod regions," the authorities in the Krasnodar region posted on Telegram on February 22 -- on the Defenders of the Fatherland holiday, which honors soldiers and veterans, and two days before the first anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. "Normal broadcasting has been restored. All information and material needed for an investigation of the incident has been provided to law enforcement."

Focus On Crimea

Another hack on the June 12 Russia Day holiday was carried out by the Free Russia Legion, a paramilitary group that has been carrying out raids into Russian territory from eastern Ukraine. The message invited residents of Ukraine's Russian-occupied Crimea region to inform the Ukrainian military about the movement of Russian troops "in order to hasten the restoration of peace and lawful order in Crimea." The statement also likened the actions of the Russian military to "the best traditions of the Third Reich."

The statement also was distributed on the websites of the state television channel Kuban 24. The government of the northwestern Kaliningrad region, on the Baltic Sea, also reported that the announcement was heard on the frequency of the commercial Russian radio station Europa Plus.

Earlier that month, the Russian Volunteer Corps, a far-right paramilitary group of ethnic Russians also fighting against Russia, carried out a similar hack with threats to attack Russian-occupied Crimea and "cleanse the peninsula." That hack reached the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, among other locations in southern Russia.

The methods for carrying out such hacks vary depending on the equipment used by the broadcaster, said an expert with the nongovernmental organization Roskomsvoboda, which monitors the Internet, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.

"If the radio station has the most basic equipment without nonessential computerization, then it can only be hacked by physical infiltration, either at the place where the broadcast equipment is located or in the studio that generates the signal," the expert told RFE/RL.

However, most modern broadcasters are connected to the Internet, which opens up many avenues for hackers to get in, he said, adding that it is possible to hijack a station's frequency directly with "sufficiently powerful equipment and a sufficiently large antenna."

Another IT specialist, who also asked not to be identified, said the networks of broadcasters can be attacked remotely.

"Once one gains access, files can be changed and alternative audio programs can be activated," the person said, adding that the most common way of gaining such access is through phishing attacks.

Unexpected Effects?

Hacks can produce a range of effects on listeners, activists say, from anger and fear to anxiety and confusion.

"The effectiveness of such hacks depends on what is transmitted," said Bogdan Litvin, the national coordinator of the Russian anti-war movement Vesna, which like many opposition groups has been deemed extremist by Putin's government. "The sound of sirens and explosions and warnings of rocket attacks are not going to increase opposition to the war. Most likely, they will increase a sense of fear, which is not going to help change public opinion."

"The idea of hacking Russian radio stations isn't a bad one," Litvin said. "But the way it is being done now might have undesired effects such as a short-term consolidation around the authorities…and support for repressive measures."

Litvin said it could be more productive to convince Russians that the war is contrary to their interests and that they are paying for it with "their money, their future, and -- for many of them -- the lives of their sons, husbands, and fathers."

Written by RFE/RL's Robert Coalson based on reporting by correspondent Andrei Krasno of RFE/RL's Caucasus.Realities