If you were struggling to access Twitter (now ‘X’) this Monday, you weren’t alone. A massive cyberattack took the social media platform down for millions of users across the globe, not just once but on three occasions throughout Monday, prompting its owner Elon Musk to allege a huge DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack.
Hours later, a little know, notorious hackers group called “Dark Storm Hackers” claimed responsibility for the attack. The disruptions began around 5:30 a.m. Eastern Time (ET), with users reporting difficulties accessing the platform on both mobile and desktop devices.
Despite initial recovery efforts, additional outages occurred at approximately 9:30 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. ET, leading to widespread frustration among users.
Elon Musk, the owner of X, addressed the situation in a post at 1:25 p.m. ET, stating, “There was (still is) a massive cyberattack against 𝕏. We get attacked every day, but this was done with a lot of resources. Either a large, coordinated group and/or a country is involved.”
In this article, we will shed light on this hackers’ group that brought down one of the biggest social media platforms on Monday evening that is now known as “Dark Storm Team”.
Are Dark Storm Hackers Pro Palestine or Pro Ukraine?
While there are conflicting reports about the origin of Dark Storm Hackers’ group, mainly two theories have been supported. One that says Dark Storm Hackers originate from Ukraine and the other that says this group is pro-Palestine and attacks those entities that are considered loyal to Israel and its allies.
X CEO Elon Musk, in an interview given post cyber attack, has claimed that the IP addresses involved in the hack might have originated from Ukraine. This comes after U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance gave a dressing down to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at The White House regarding the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.
Musk is considered close to both President Trump and VP JD Vance and according to him, the cyber attack on X could be a result of the geo-political quagmire.
Another theory that is circulating about Dark Storm Hackers Team is that they are “hacktivists” who have pro-Palestine leanings and it carriers out cyber attacks against entities that are considered pro-Israel. Check Point Research (CPR) group reported that this pro-Palestinian cyberattack group is behind this DDoS attack on X.
Who Are Dark Storm Hackers?
Dark Storm Hackers group have been active on Telegram as early as 2023 and many a times they have been labeled as “ideological hackers” who target pro-Israel entities in the wake of ongoing Israel Hamas war in Gaza, Palestine.
However, there are also reports that Dark Storm group also collaborates with pro-Russian entities leveraging leveraging these partnerships to expand its operations. It is behind some big cyber attacks and specializes in remote access, data infiltration, ransomware, and DDoS attacks, primarily targeting state organizations.
They’ve been active for a while, targeting everything from financial institutions to government systems, but today, they set their sights on X.
How Did Dark Storm Hackers Attack X?
So, what exactly happened? Early Monday morning, users started reporting that they couldn’t access X. According to Downdetector, complaints spiked to over 41,000 at one point.
Cybersecurity experts revealed that the attack was a multi-layered DDoS attack that overwhelmed X’s servers with an enormous volume of fake requests. However, this wasn’t a simple flood of traffic. The hackers used a botnet of hijacked devices, including compromised personal computers and IoT devices like smart cameras and routers
Additionally, analysts suspect the group attempted to exploit vulnerabilities in X’s infrastructure, possibly injecting malicious scripts to disrupt data flow or gain access to sensitive information. While there’s no confirmation of a data breach, experts warn that such attacks often have long-term consequences beyond temporary downtime.
Shortly after, Dark Storm Hackers took to Telegram to boast about their involvement. They basically admitted to bringing one of the world’s biggest social media platforms to its knees.
What’s Next for X and Elon Musk?
X’s security teams are actively working to strengthen their defenses. However the recent cyber attacks have raised concerns about the security of user data and platform ability to face certain attacks. DDoS attacks can raise several problems like disrupt planform services, causing financial losses to users and decrease the trust in the platform.
Recently, these cyber attacks have become a big concern for the technological landscape. In the world of crypto, the Lazarus Group and recently the Bybit and WazirX crypto exchanges face similar kinds of attacks and lose billions in these attacks. Users had to lose crores of rupees in these attacks. This is a worrying issue that needs to be resolved.
What do you think? Is this just another cyberattack, or a sign of bigger threats ahead?
