It was reported a couple of weeks ago that there had been a cyberattack during the 2018 Winter Olympic Games opening ceremony and while it was confirmed by the organizers, they didn’t point fingers at any individuals or nation states. The Washington Post reports today that Russian hackers were responsible for this cyberattack and that they later tried to pin it on North Korea. The Washington Post’s report cites officials from the U.S. intelligence community.
According to the report, the Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) of Russia was able to access around 300 computers, hacked routers, and also distributed malware in the days leading up to the opening ceremonies and during the ceremonies as well.
Officials cited in the report speculate that this cyberattack was in retaliation to the ban on Russian athletes following a systematic doping scandal. The Russians apparently used North Korean IP addresses to pin the attack to the country that has been blamed for some cyberattacks of its own as well.
The cyberattack didn’t cause any major damage, though, as it only took down the internet and Wi-Fi access during the opening ceremonies. The 2018 Winter Olympic Games website as also down as a result of this hack but the contests themselves remained unaffected.
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