Sudan-based hackers shut down X for hours demands for Starlink

Ravi Kumar

Sep 04,2023
2 min read
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Elon Musk-run X (formerly Twitter) went down for hours for thousands of users after Sudan-based hackers hit the platform in a bid to put pressure on Musk into launching his cheaper internet Starlink service in their country. The hacking group, called Anonymous Sudan, attacked X and took it offline in more than a dozen countries, reports the BBC. X was down for more than two hours, with thousands of users affected.

X (Twitter) owner Elon Musk (AP)

X experienced an outage lasting over two hours due to a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack, affecting thousands of users. A DDoS attack involves overwhelming a server with excessive requests, rendering it inaccessible.

Downdetector, a site tracking service outages, registered nearly 20,000 outage reports from users in the US and the UK.

However, the group has denied its association with Russia. The gang in June posted a message in support of the Russian government to end the mutiny led by Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner paramilitary group. The hacking group has earlier caused disruptions in France, Nigeria, Israel and the US.

The hacking group, called Anonymous Sudan, attacked X and took it offline in more than a dozen countries, reports the BBC. X was down for more than two hours, with thousands of users affected. A Microsoft spokeswoman later confirmed that the group, self-identifying as "Anonymous Sudan," was behind these attacks.

Some cybersecurity experts speculate that the group may have Russian affiliation. However, the BBC report added that the group's key member shared his live location on the Telegram app and sent pictures of his Sudanese passport suggesting they are in Sudan.

Anonymous Sudan' hacking group

The Anonymous Sudan hacking group has earned notoriety for its cyber attacks.

In a recent incident, the Anonymous Sudan group launched a DDoS attack on AO3 (Archive of Our Own), a nonprofit website for fan-created content, citing opposition to what they deemed "degeneracy" and the presence of LGBTQ+ and NSFW content on the site.

Conclusion

Hofa, a member of the hacking group, was quoted as saying that the Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack was targeted at raising awareness about the war in Sudan which is "making the internet very bad and it goes down quite often for us".

Anonymous Sudan is linked with a Russian cyber-military unit. However, the group has denied its association with Russia.