Report: Russia carried out 34 hybrid attacks against Romania in 2024

Russia carried out 34 hybrid attacks against Romania in 2024, according to a report presented in the Italian Parliament, based on information published by Romanian authorities regarding last year’s annulled presidential elections.

On March 3, Italy’s ambassador to Bucharest, Alfred Maria Durande, announced that foreign forces were involved in the 2024 presidential elections in Romania. He spoke of an "intense and profound manipulation" of the electoral process in the country.

The report presented before the Italian legislature, cited by Digi24, is in line with the ambassador's statements. It argues that Romania saw aggressive hybrid attacks on its electoral process.

Roughly 25,000 TikTok accounts became highly active in supporting presidential candidate Călin Georgescu two weeks before the November 2024 elections. Additionally, the report presented in the Italian Parliament mentions 797 pro-Georgescu accounts created in 2016 that became highly active shortly before the elections.

There were also 5,005 Telegram accounts spreading propaganda in favor of Călin Georgescu, and USD 381,000 was spent on sponsoring this content, according to the report. The sum was spent only from October 24, 2024, onward, shortly before the election.

The cited source also mentioned 85,000 direct cyberattacks on Romania’s electoral infrastructure up until November 25. The attacks originated from servers in 33 different countries but are attributed to the Kremlin.

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