Online broadcasts of Putin address disrupted by DDoS attack

Business Insider reports that several Russian websites providing a livestream of Russian President Vladimir Putin's annual speech were disrupted by a distributed denial-of-service attack. All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, or VGTRK, and livestream platform Smotrim.ru, were reported by Reuters to have had their broadcasts of the speech, which contained Putin's intentions to restart nuclear weapons testing, interrupted by the DDoS attack, which was confirmed by Russian state-controlled news agency RIA Novosti. The attack was claimed to be conducted by the IT Army of Ukraine hacktivist operation, which emerged following Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year. "We launched a DDoS attack on channels showing Putin's address to the federal assembly: 1TV, VGTRK and SMOTRIM. Slava Ukraini," said IT Army of Ukraine in a tweet. However, the attack was also admitted by a separate hacking operation claiming to be affiliated with Russian opposition activist Alexey Navalny, according to a Newsweek report.