Belarusian 'Cyber Partisans' forced the resignation of an Aeroflot top manager
Anton Matskevich, Aeroflot's Deputy CEO for Information Technologies, has left his position. This happened after a massive attack by Belarusian hackers that paralyzed the operations of Russia's largest airline this summer.
According to the newspaper 'Kommersant', Matskevich was dismissed in mid-December. Although the company officially states his resignation was 'at his own request,' industry sources directly link this resignation to the successful cyberattack carried out on July 28 by the Silent Crow group and the Belarusian 'Cyber Partisans'.
At that time, as a result of the system breach, Aeroflot was forced to cancel dozens of flights, leading to colossal losses and a reputational blow.
The Belarusian 'Cyber Partisans' later revealed the details of the operation, pointing to the complete vulnerability of the Russian aviation giant: employees used outdated versions of Windows, and their passwords were too easy to crack.
Aeroflot is trying to save face and praises Matskevich, stating that under him there was "a significant leap in the development of the company's IT direction regarding import substitution and the implementation of the group's digital transformation strategy".
However, experts note that it was precisely the Belarusian hackers who revealed the real state of information security within the company. Matskevich's resignation was expected back in the summer, immediately after the 'Cyber Partisans' publicly exposed the flaws in the carrier's system protection.
According to the 'Cyber Partisans' group, the Russian airline Aeroflot participated in organizing military air transport.
The attack by Belarusian Cyber Partisans caused Aeroflot damages of 10-50 million dollars.