Russia said that it has foiled a wide-ranging plot by foreign spies to destabilize Russia's financial system.
The Russian Federal Security Service, the FSB, said that a cyberattack by "foreign intelligence services" was scheduled for Dec. 5, and that it would have involved offensives on several banks and various cities.
The FSB also said that a disinformation and propaganda campaign was part of the plan, in which the attackers would spread fake news about Russian banks, send mass text messages to that same effect and publish stories on social media questioning banks’ financial stability and licenses to operate—all with the purpose of creating bank runs and wreaking havoc.
The FSB didn’t reveal which country was hatching the plot, but it did say that its intelligence showed that the hackers were planning to use servers located in the Netherlands that are owned by a Ukrainian company called BlazingFast.
"We cannot find any malicious data," company director Anton Onoprichuk told CNNMoney. "We have many customers and nobody can prove that our customers did anything wrong."
The Dutch ministry of Security and Justice meanwhile issued a statement: "In case a cyberattack does occur on Monday, than it is up to the Russian authorities to decide whether to start an investigation. ... If desired, they can ask the Dutch investigating authorities for assistance.”
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