Иллюстрация: Киберпартизаны.
The Belarusian hacktivist group Cyber Partisans, as well as the Silent Crow group, have been designated extremist organisations by Russia’s Supreme Court.
“The Supreme Court of Russia has granted the administrative claim seeking recognition of the hacker groups ‘Cyberpartizans BY’ (‘Cyber Partisans’, Cyberpartizans) and Silent Crow as extremist organisations and has banned their activities in the territory of the Russian Federation,” the court ruling states.
The case was heard behind closed doors.
According to the Russian authorities, the groups were involved in cyberattacks targeting Russia’s critical infrastructure and state institutions. In June 2025, the Cyber Partisans and Silent Crow carried out an attack on the Russian airline Aeroflot, compromising and destroying the company’s internal IT infrastructure. Aeroflot was forced to cancel some flights. Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office opened a criminal case on charges of unlawful access to computer information. The Cyber Partisans have also repeatedly attacked the websites of Belarusian state institutions and state-owned companies, including gaining access to sensitive data.
In Belarus, the Supreme Court declared the informal organisation Supraciu and its affiliated initiatives — Cyber Partisans, People’s Self-Defence Units (DNS) and Busly Liatsiats — a terrorist organisation as early as 2021.
In its reasoning, the Russian Supreme Court specifically referred to the Belarusian precedent.
“The court established that the Cyberpartizans BY association (‘Cyber Partisans’, Cyberpartizans) is part of the informal organisation Supraciu (‘Resistance’), whose main objective is the violent overthrow of the constitutional order of the Republic of Belarus. Resistance cooperates with the terrorist The Kalinouski Regiment, which recruits individuals to participate in combat operations in Ukraine against the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The Cyber Partisans are also affiliated with a psychological and information operations unit of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” TASS quoted the ruling as saying.
In Belarus, accusations of extremism and terrorism have frequently been used against Lukashenka’s opponents and dissent more broadly.