Was Twitter denial-of-service targeting anti-Russian blogger?

Today isn’t just the day after Twitter disappeared for a few hours. It’s also the first anniversary of Georgian troops moving into South Ossetia, an incident which lead to conflict between the Russian and Georgian armies last year.

Perhaps surprisingly, the two may not be disconnected.

The major DDoS campaign which brought Twitter to its knees yesterday (and mildly impacted the likes of Facebook, LiveJournal, Google’s Blogger and possibly YouTube service) may have actually set out to silence only one person – an anti-Russian blogger called Cyxymu from Tbilisi.

This raises the astonishing thought that a vendetta against a single user caused Twitter to crumble, forcing us to ask serious questions about the site’s fragility.

Facebook’s Chief Security Officer Max Kelly Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

Found this article interesting? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter, Mastodon, or Threads to read more of the exclusive content we post.

Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry, having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky, or drop him an email.