Russia-Ukraine war updates from March 22, 2024

Russian hackers last month targeted German political parties with a phishing campaign, Google’s cyber unit Mandiant said in an alert released on their website.

“Phishing emails were sent to victims purporting to be an invite to a dinner reception on 01 March bearing a logo from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), a major political party in Germany,” the alert said.

Mandiant said the Russian group behind the attack was identified as APT29, which has been linked to Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Services.

“This is the first time we have seen this APT29 cluster target political parties, indicating a possible area of emerging operational focus beyond the typical targeting of diplomatic missions,” the alert read.

“We judge this activity to present a broad threat to European and other Western political parties from across the political spectrum.”

Germany’s Federal Office for Information Security did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

— Sophie Kiderlin

Pictures show destruction in cities across Ukraine after the latest round of Russian missile strikes on the country. The attacks damaged electricity and other infrastructure as well as residential buildings in Ukraine on Friday.

“Russia is at war with people’s everyday lives,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a post on social media platform X on Friday.