US disrupts Russian military-run DNS hijacking network, Justice Department says
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Officials in Germany and Britain also issued advisories about the hacking campaign on April 7.
PHOTO: ST FILE
WASHINGTON - The US Justice Department said on April 7 it carried out a court-authorised disruption of a DNS hijacking network controlled by a Russian military intelligence unit.
The network was operated by Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff (GRU) Military Unit 26165, the department said in a statement.
It added the GRU used routers to facilitate hijacking operations against worldwide targets, including individuals in military, government and critical infrastructure sectors.
The efforts targeted thousands of routers worldwide and enabled the Russian hackers to filter traffic to identify specific targets, according to the Justice Department.
Once targets were identified, targets’ unencrypted network traffic was captured, providing the hackers with passwords, authentication tokens, emails and other sensitive information, it added.
“GRU actors compromised routers in the US and around the world, hijacking them to conduct espionage. Given the scale of this threat, sounding the alarm wasn’t enough,” said Mr Brett Leatherman, the assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division.
The FBI identified compromised routers in the US, collected evidence of Russian targeting, cut off GRU access, and reset them to normal functionality, the Justice Department said in its statement.
In a post on social media platform X, Mr Leatherman said the takedown effort, dubbed “Operation Masquerade,” included partners in 15 countries.
Without action, “the GRU would have continued intercepting encrypted traffic and stealing sensitive information,” he said, adding, “Russia’s cyber program is an enduring threat.”
Officials in Germany and Britain also issued advisories about the hacking campaign on April 7.
The Russian Embassy in Washington did not respond to requests for comment.
The operation is the latest example of intelligence collection carried out by the Russian military intelligence hacking unit, Microsoft said in a blog post released ahead of the Justice Department’s statement.
Microsoft identified more than 200 organisations and 5,000 consumer devices impacted by the hacking operation, the company said.
Lumen Technologies’ Black Lotus Labs, which identified part of the botnet infrastructure in 2025, said in a blog post that the operations primarily targeted government agencies, including ministries of foreign affairs, law enforcement and third-party email providers.
The researchers did not identify specific targets, but said their analysis revealed targets in the US, Europe, Afghanistan, North Africa, Central America and South-east Asia. REUTERS
