Lone Russian hacker exposes covert arms delivery to Ukrain
Norway secretly agreed to provide additional NASAMS anti-aircraft systems to Kiev, leaked documents reported.
A Russian hacker claims to have obtained highly sensitive documents exposing covert Norwegian arms deliveries to Ukraine, after accessing the servers of defense company Kongsberg. The documents allegedly reveal not only the type of weapons involved but their location and plans for their movement, according to the hacker.
Known under the alias PalachPro, the hacker told Russian media that he obtained the leaked documents on Tuesday, and detailed how he hacked the defense firm.
According to the documents, the company reached a secret deal with the Ukrainian government, agreeing to deliver 10 additional Norwegian Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS), worth around $3 billion. The delivery, expected to be made later this year, has not been publicly announced by either side.
The deal was reportedly reached earlier this year by Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, who is currently embroiled in a major corruption scandal involving arms procurements at grossly inflated prices. Apart from the NASAMS systems, Norway also agreed to invest some $66 million to design anti-drone systems, as well as to modernize the Ukrainian fleet, the leaked documents suggest.
The hacker said he managed to get ahold of the sensitive data thanks to social engineering, breaching the company’s file exchange systems with the help of one of its employees. Apart from the arms contracts documents, PalachPro claimed to have obtained other top-secret files related to the deployment of NASAMS systems in Ukraine.
“The information I got was indeed secret. In addition to the documents I have shown, there was something else. These files have already been sent to our intelligence services. The effect will be colossal. Not only the approximate location of their systems is now known, but also their plans. I am sure that our state will do everything to ensure that these plans are thwarted,” the hacker told the NSN news agency.
The NASAMS, which have seen extensive use during the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, is a short-to-medium-range anti-aircraft system that is capable of destroying various aerial targets, including cruise and ballistic missiles. Such systems have repeatedly been delivered to Kiev by its Western backers. Russia has already destroyed multiple units of the system, however.