Swiss issue arrest warrant for three pro-Russian hackers

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The Office of the Attorney General (OAG) is looking for three members of “NoName”, a group that has attacked various federal websites, including during a video address by Volodymyr Zelensky to the Swiss parliament in 2023.

Following several DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) attacks on federal sites in June 2023, the OAG initially opened criminal proceedings against unknown perpetrators.

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The pro-Russian group “NoName057(16)” claimed responsibility for the attacks, which also targeted the visit by former Swiss President Alain Berset to Kyiv in November 2023, the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2024 and 2025, the Bürgenstock peace conference in June 2024, and the Eurovision in Basel in May 2025.

Three key figures

As a result of international investigations coordinated by Europol and involving the Swiss Federal Office of Police (Fedpol), several members of the group were identified in spring 2025, the OAG said in a press release on Wednesday. The OAG thus extended criminal proceedings to these individuals and issued an arrest warrant. It intends to suspend further criminal proceedings until their arrest.

On Tuesday, police raids, computer seizures and arrests took place in several countries. For the time being, no computer involved in the network or any person domiciled in the country has been identified in Switzerland, according to the OAG.

Vast networks

Eurojust, the European agency for judicial cooperation in criminal matters, reported on Wednesday that 12 countries had taken part in the raids. The hackers’ network, using hundreds of computer systems around the world, was dismantled and a total of seven arrest warrants issued, including against the main figures of “NoName”, who live in Russia.

To carry out its attacks, the group recruited members via a messaging service. Eurojust estimates that the hackers were able to mobilise some 4,000 users who supported their operations.

In addition to Switzerland, several European countries have been targeted by similar cyberattacks, including during elections. This was the case in Sweden, where official and bank websites have been targeted, or more recently in the Netherlands during the NATO summit at the end of June.

Translated from French by DeepL/dos

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