Lithuania Says Hit by Cyberattack, Russia ‘Probably’ to Blame

Lithuania said Monday it had been hit by an “intense” cyberattack, probably Russian, days after Moscow protested restrictions Vilnius imposed on the rail transit of certain goods to Kaliningrad.

Russia last week threatened reprisals against the Baltic nation after Vilnius imposed the restrictions, which it said was simply the application of European Union sanctions.

“Lithuanian state institutions and companies are under intense DDoS attack,” said a defence ministry statement posted on Twitter.

A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is designed to overwhelm the target with a flood of internet traffic, preventing the system from functioning normally.

“It is likely that similar attacks will continue in the coming days, especially in the transport, energy and financial sectors,” the statement added.

[ Read: Russia, Ukraine and the Danger of a Global Cyberwar ]

Jonas Skardinskas, the head of Lithuania’s National Cyber Security Centre, said secure servers had been among those targeted in the attack, which he said “probably” came from Russia.

The Russian hackers’ group Killnet claimed responsibility for the cyberattack, which it said in a statement was in retaliation for the restrictions imposed by Lithuania earlier in June.

Lithuanian officials said later Monday that the most important attacks had been brought under control, and Skardinskas said there had been no major damage.

Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte said that such attacks had become frequent since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began in late February.