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Russia Claims Election Systems Hit by Cyberattacks During First Parliamentary Vote Since 2022
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Russian authorities claimed on September 19 that electronic voting systems and communications infrastructure had been attacked during the country's three-day parliamentary election, the Kyiv Independent reported on September 20.
According to the outlet, the vote is Russia's first since it launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and the first to organize balloting in temporarily occupied parts of four Ukrainian regions.
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The election is taking place with little genuine opposition, as most anti-war candidates have been barred from running and the ruling United Russia party dominates the political system. Russia also declined to invite OSCE election observers, a decision the organization stated violated Moscow’s commitments and prevented independent international monitoring.
The Kyiv Independent noted that Ella Pamfilova, head of Russia's Central Election Commission, reported Moscow's online voting system had faced a major cyberattack overnight, with attempts to disrupt it being repelled. The outlet added that the claim could not be independently verified.
Russia's Digital Ministry separately claimed an attempted act of sabotage against communications infrastructure in the country's Far East, according to the report.
Officials stated the attempt had been stopped and communications restored without disrupting voting.
The outlet reported that Russia's Supreme Court removed the liberal Yabloko party from the nationwide ballot in August after a legal challenge to its registration.
Yabloko is the only registered Russian party that has openly opposed the war against Ukraine, though some of its candidates remain in individual constituency races, according to the report.
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Voting for the 450-seat State Duma began on September 18 and runs through September 20, the Kyiv Independent wrote, with the Kremlin-aligned United Russia party dominating the lower house.
Russian election officials reported a turnout of about 45% nationwide by the morning of September 20, according to the outlet.
The temporarily occupied territory voting covers parts of Ukraine's Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions.
Ukraine has condemned the organization of Russian elections on temporarily occupied Ukrainian territory as illegal.
In a statement on September 14, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) urged residents of the temporarily occupied territories not to take part in the vote. The agency described the ballot as an illegal effort to legitimize Kremlin rule and gather support for Russia's ruling political forces.
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The SBU traced the practice to the September 2022 pseudo-referendum staged across temporarily occupied parts of the same four regions, during which Russian authorities pressured residents to participate.
In 2023, the agency noted that Russia held pseudo-elections for its regional bodies on temporarily occupied land.
The Kyiv Independent added that the European Union will not recognize results from Russia-occupied Ukrainian territories, describing the voting there as a violation of international law.
The staging of votes across temporarily occupied areas of Ukraine began weeks before the nationwide ballot opened, with early balloting in Russian-held parts of the south starting on August 29 and early voting in temporarily occupied Donetsk on September 14.
Mobile polling teams, escorted by armed Russian servicemen and police, moved through settlements collecting ballots at residents' homes.
In the Zaporizhzhia region, the identities of soldiers killed in action were allegedly used to fabricate ballots for the ruling United Russia party. Clerical staff reportedly delayed death registrations so the names remained active, allowing ballots to be cast in occupied Melitopol, Berdiansk, and Tokmak.
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