The Senate website had been inaccessible since mid-morning Friday, May 5. The blocking was claimed by the pro-Russian hacker collective NoName. At the end of March, the site of the Assembly had been blocked for several hours by an attack claimed by the same collective, for the same reason.
"Access to the Senate website has been disrupted since this morning, our team is fully mobilized to remedy the malfunctions," the Senate tweeted at 10:52 a.m. In the early afternoon, the Senate website was again accessible.
Thirty minutes earlier, NoName had claimed responsibility for the attack on its Telegram channel, with a message in Russian and English criticizing France's support for Ukraine. "We read in the press that France is working with Ukraine on a new aid plan which may include weapons, as well as statements by Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna" and "we blocked the Senate website French,” continues the group of hackers.
The group also claims to have attacked the site of the National Center for Space Studies, one of the sites of the Ministry of Labor and the site of the Naval Group company, specializing in naval defense construction. By early afternoon, these sites were partially accessible.
Eighty pro-Russian hacker collectives
"This is obviously a denial of service attack, overwhelming the site with requests," commented cybersecurity expert Nicolas Hernandez, president of Aleph Networks. NoName, created in March 2022, is one of some eighty collectives of pro-Russian hackers who attack the institutions of countries that support Ukraine, in particular France, explained at the end of March Nicolas Quintin, chief analyst of the Thales threat analysis team, which brings together around fifty experts worldwide.
On Wednesday, the websites of several French town halls were attacked by Russian "hacktivists". The hackers notably targeted the IT services company Abtel, based in Nîmes, which hosts the site of several town halls, including Bry-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne), Juziers (Yvelines) and Ambérieu-en-Bugey (Ain ). A few days earlier, the site of the mayor of Reyrieux (Ain) had been hacked, reports Le Progrès.
On the site of the city of Bry-sur-Marne, the hackers broadcast in Russian "propaganda messages namely 'Respect Russia! Otherwise we will continue to wage war on you”, detailed the prefecture of Val-de-Marne.
