President Vladimir Putin warned Thursday that Russia is actively retaliating in response to recent Ukrainian attacks on its data centers, while simultaneously brushing off recent drone attacks on oil refineries.
“They took the first step and we began to answer. Now they’re squealing over energy, as well as other facilities, including data centers. They started it. They shouldn’t have started it,” Putin said via video link at a business forum.
“Before taking this step, they should have thought carefully about the consequences,” he told the Delovaya Rossiya association.
His first public comments acknowledging drone attacks targeting Yandex and Sberbank data centers this month contradict the Russian Defense Ministry’s own reports that it began striking Ukrainian data centers last month.
At the same forum, Putin downplayed the impact of recent Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries, including a fire at Rosneft’s Ryazan refinery on Thursday.
“They hit here and there. Nothing particularly significant, but nevertheless they persist,” the Russian leader said of the refinery attacks.
Putin also admitted that Russian security services failed to anticipate attacks targeting commercial logistics hubs like Wildberries and Ozon.
“They’re constantly taking steps that, frankly, we probably should have foreseen, but we thought they wouldn’t think of doing it. They thought of it,” he said, responding to Wildberries co-founder Tatiana Kim.
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