On 10 April, the Lithuanian Defense Ministry and its minister Raimundas Karoblis were the target of a major disinformation campaign that aimed at “discrediting not only the minister as a politician but also the entire Lithuanian national defense system and damaging public trust and support to the armed forces.” The campaign against the NATO member state was probably the work of a foreign government, with Russia being the main suspect.
In the first stage of the attack, threat actors sent spear phishing messages that appeared to come from a Ministry of Defense employee to various email addresses at different branches of the Lithuanian government. The messages contained a fake news story accusing Karoblis of corruption as well as malicious links. The attackers also managed to inject fake news stories into legitimate news portals in Lithuania and across the Baltics, while a shady US news outlet also promoted the story.
The Lithuanian National Cyber Security Center is investigating the attack, which it attributes to a foreign government. The Kremlin is the top suspect, since Russia has been targeting Lithuania and other NATO member states with similar disinformation campaigns for years.
Read more: Major coordinated disinformation campaign hit the Lithuanian Defense
