Ioan Feher, a Romanian living in the United Kingdom, is suspected of collaborating with the Russian Killnet hackers group, which has carried out DDoS assaults on the websites of the Romanian government, the Ministry of National Defense, the Romanian Police, as well as airports, and Digi24 television. The Russian group’s attacks occurred during the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

Since April April 29, a large-scale cyberattack was launched against Romanian government institutions. The websites of the Romanian government, the Ministry of National Defense, Romanian Railways (CFR), and the Romanian Border Police were all targeted.

The attack on the Romanian Institutes’ websites was claimed by Killnet, a Russian cyber hacker outfit. Killnet has vowed to conduct cyber operations against countries and organisations that have provided Ukraine with material assistance.

Cyber attacks on Romanian sites have prompted the formation of a crisis cell made up of experts from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Directorate General of Internal Protection, the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Police, and other defence structures and institutions to protect public and national security.

After the investigations, Bucharest officials found the Romanian living in the United Kingdom who reportedly worked with the Killnet gang. According to a press statement from the Romanian Police, the Romanian supplied “help for the translation from Russian into Romanian of the criminal group’s documents and by indicating several Romanian websites that could have been attacked using the same style of operation.”

According to the authorities, the Romanian citizen is currently in the custody of the British authorities.

Meanwhile, Killnet sent a message on the Telegram stating that the Romanian Ioan Feher supported the group of hackers. He threatens that the group will “destroy Romania, Great Britain and Moldova if he is not released”.

Leave him alone. If he supports Russia, it does not mean that he is a criminal. If it is not released within 48 hours, we will destroy Romania, Great Britain and Moldova. We will destroy the entire information structure and the Ministry of Health. You will realize that you made a mistake.

Killnet communication on Telegram

Cyberint’s director, Anton Rog, told a local TV station that SRI has evidence of a higher number of Romanians operating for the pro-Russian hacker group Killnet.

Next to this category are Romanians who designate targets and, if they don’t, make comments in favour of Russia, against Romania, against Europe, against NATO, against Ukraine, and against the Romanian government.

Anton Rog, Cyberint CEO

Several hacking attacks on Romanian institutions’ websites have occurred in recent days. Romanian officials allege that these attacks are motivated by Romania’s backing of Ukraine during the Russian Federation’s invasion of the country.

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The global Capture the Flag is one of Trend Micro’s most popular industry initiatives, designed to help tackle skill shortages by finding and nurturing the talent of tomorrow. The search is particularly critical in a world of rapidly evolving cyber-threats where supply chain attacks, IoT threats, AI tools, and more represent a growing risk to global organizations.

The sheer volatility of today’s threat landscape and the size of the modern corporate attack surface is pushing existing security practitioners to the limits. It’s made platform-based security a crucial enterprise strategy to help maximize protection and ROI. In this fast-moving world, organizations must ensure their IT security teams have the right skills for the job. The talented participants in this year’s Capture the Flag stand as a strong reassurance about the future.

Mike Gibson, vice president of customer success and security research for Trend Micro

Like the 2020 event, this year’s competition featured two virtual rounds: an online qualifier running over a 24-hour period and the finals event. Teams battled it out for the CTF crown on December 18-19 in a Dynamic Jeopardy competition.

Challenges were designed to address critical areas of cybersecurity including Reversing, Cloud, IoT, OSINT, Forensics, and Machine Learning.

The final results – Romanian Team PwnThyBytes wins

First Place: PwnThyBytes (Romania)

Second Place: Bad Guesser (China)

Third Place: CodeRed (Korea)

The winning team from the finals received ¥1,000,000 (approximately $9,000 USD). Each player from the winning team also received 15,000 Zero Day Initiative Rewards Program points towards exclusive awards and benefits. The winners will also be automatically seeded in the 2022 competition.

The second and third place teams received ¥300,000 and ¥200,000 ($2,600 USD and $1,800 USD respectively).

About Trend Micro
Trend Micro, a global cybersecurity leader, helps make the world safe for exchanging digital information. Fueled by decades of security expertise, global threat research, and continuous innovation, Trend Micro’s cybersecurity platform protects hundreds of thousands of organizations and millions of individuals across clouds, networks, devices, and endpoints. As a leader in cloud and enterprise cybersecurity, the platform delivers a powerful range of advanced threat defense techniques optimized for environments like AWS, Microsoft, and Google, and central visibility for better, faster detection and response. With 7,000 employees across 65 countries, Trend Micro enables organizations to simplify and secure their connected world.

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On Saturday, May 22, the website, hosted in Romania, displays one single white on red message:

SITE CLOSED! Mr. dottore Ponta Victor Viorel, you cannot say you are honest as long as you offer as gift 40,000 jackets and you do not report this to the Permanent Electoral Authority.

Message on Romanian PRO Romania party’s website

The electoral law in Romania says the parties have to declare all their spending during campaigns. The offering of electoral gifts is forbidden, but in practice, the parties do not obey the rule.

“Dottore” is the nickname the former Prime Minister was given by the former president, Traian Basescu, when it was found out that Victor Ponta’s doctoral thesis in law was partially plagiarized.

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