Cyber war launched on Russia
Ukrainians are fighting a new cyber war against Vladimir Putin.
Electronic music DJ Oleksandr Menzheres is one of dozens of hackers hitting the sites of the Russian state, propaganda channels and financial institutions.
He has no military training but still wanted to fight.
The 42-year-old Kyiv native, who runs a software development company, joined the newly formed IT Army, which disrupts digital services in Russia by taking targeted sites offline.
Oleksandr said: “Army forces fight in the field. The IT community should fight in the cybersecurity area.”
The original group now has more than 310,000 members from Ukraine and around the world.
Successful attacks from the IT Army, as well as existing hacking groups such as Anonymous, have been launched in recent weeks.
State-owned TV channels like Russia-24 played footage of the war in Ukraine earlier this month.
The sites of banks and utility companies in Russia have also been hit by attacks.
One of the methods used by the IT Army is distributed denial of service – or DDoS attacks – where a targeted server or web service is overwhelmed with a flood of internet traffic that prevents normal traffic getting through.
The targets for such groups are updated on a daily basis.
Meanwhile, another 100 orphans are ready to be evacuated from Ukraine with the help of the £60,000 raised so far by newspaper readers.
The charity Hope and Homes for Children wants to get children to safety from five orphanages in Odessa, where fierce fighting has erupted.
Hope and Homes boss
Mark Waddington said: “They are sitting on their suitcases ready to go.
“And we will get them out of the country once we have permission from the Ukrainian authorities.”