BREAKING: Hungarian foreign ministry was aware of Russian cyber attacks, insider documents prove
A friendship based on trust? Internal documents prove that the Hungarian foreign ministry was aware of Russian cyber attacks after it emerged two years ago that Vladimir Putin’s hackers had attacked the Hungarian foreign ministry’s IT network.
444.hu has presented new documents proving that Russia’s military and civilian intelligence services have carried out a large-scale cyber attack against the Hungarian foreign ministry’s systems. Two years ago, the foreign ministry and several pro-government politicians simply denied that this had happened, describing the information as “campaign lies” (the parliamentary elections took place two years ago in Hungary, in 2022).
The Russians stole invaluable national security data from foreign ministry computers
In March 2022, Direkt36 revealed that Russian secret services had carried out a large-scale cyber attack against the IT network of the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. At the time, the Foreign Ministry responded by saying,
“We do not address campaign lies”.
Direkt36 journalist Szabolcs Panyi reconstructed the Russian intelligence operation against Hungarian diplomacy with the help of background conversations. He described how Putin’s hackers broke into the foreign ministry’s computer network and internal correspondence and gained access to everything there. The ministry and several Fidesz politicians clearly denied the news portal’s reports.
However, according to internal documents seen by 444.hu, it is clear not only that these attacks took place, but also that the foreign ministry knew about them. A letter from the head of one of Hungary’s secret services clearly describes the scale of the Russian cyber attacks and makes clear who the perpetrators are. (Check out the documents in 444.hu’s article HERE.)
The then Director General of the Hungarian National Security Service (Nemzetbiztonsági Szakszolgálat, NBSZ), Lieutenant General Hedvig Szabó, gave a report on the state of the foreign ministry’s IT network at the end of September 2021. In the letter, she described that
“due to the total exposure, more than 4000 workstations and more than 930 servers have become unreliable”.
Russian cyber attacks: The intruders are known
This reveals that the hackers could have seen emails, files, personal data of foreign ministry staff and a host of other sensitive information. It also clearly describes who the hackers were who attacked the Hungarian diplomatic IT system:
“The recent attacks have been linked by attack attributes to the APT 28 (Russian, GRU) and APT 29 (Russian, FSB or SVR) groups.”
The abbreviation APT refers to the English term advanced persistent threat. It is used to denote hacker groups, typically state or government-funded. GRU is an acronym for the Russian General Reconnaissance Directorate, the military intelligence service. FSB is the Russian Federal Security Service, Russia’s most extensive domestic intelligence service, and SVR is Russia’s foreign intelligence service.
“Best national security system in Europe”?
A few days ago, Viktor Orbán said that “We have the best national security system in Europe, both in terms of technical and human capabilities”.
On Monday, 13 May 2024, 444.hu asked Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó how, if what Viktor Orbán said was true, it was possible that Russian secret service hackers were able to penetrate the ministry’s system and steal huge amounts of data.
“I am not aware of such a thing,”
he began his answer, at a time when he did not know that the journalists were aware of the comprehensive NBSZ report on the Russian cyber attack. When 444.hu showed him the letter from the former Director General of the NBSZ, he questioned whether they legally have the documents that prove these Russian cyber attacks.
As 444.hu writes, it is important to note that they have checked their sources and verified the authenticity of the documents in accordance with the rules of the press. These documents are not covered by the Classified Information Protection Act (Minősített adat védelméről szóló törvény).
“After two years, we have gone from the government claiming that the widespread Russian cyber attack was a campaign lie to claiming that we are damaging the national interest by exposing it in public,”
444.hu writes.
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Soon Hungary will not only compromise the security if its citizens but also from all the EU, unfortunately the eu can not get rid of Hungary or orban. This has to end in some way but the sooner the better as fidesz is a Russian trojan horse.
And still, Mr. Putin and his cronies are our Politicians BFFs. Dependency, some shared interest or fear of something?
Very worrisome situation for all of our allies – be it in the EU or NATO. Am sure China won´t mind, though!
If Hungary was aware that their site was hacked that the ministry would put anything important on the site. This is tantamount to the use of double agents by Britain during WWII and the cold war.
Nice try, but such ‘breaking news’ from a government-hating media source may not be the most reliable.
Expect more such attacks from the supposedly non-existing opposition media before the EU election in June.😎
This has been known for some time. No one in NATO or the EU has trusted Hungary for years. The Orban government has actively allowed the Russians open access to classified information by looking the other way and keeping silent while they conduct their hacking. The bottom line is that Hungary is a NATO in name but definitely not in deed. ORBAN = PUTIN.
Trusting Orbánistan is like trusting Judas.
This gives more credibility to the idea or strategy that Russia and one presumes some Anglo interests, wish to use Hungary as Trojan horse with hacking to access EU and NATO communications.