A Norwegian Parliament cyberattack temporarily disrupted the Storting’s website on Monday, 14 September, with the pro-Russian hacker group Server Killers claiming responsibility. The incident was identified as a distributed denial-of-service, or DDoS, attack, which overwhelms a website with large volumes of traffic and can make it unavailable to legitimate users.
The Storting’s website experienced intermittent outages during the afternoon. Bjarne Østby, head of the parliament’s IT department, told Norwegian media that officials were experiencing instability and were working to stabilise traffic.
According to VG, the website was accessible again by Monday evening.
Pro-Russian group claims the Norwegian Parliament cyberattack
Server Killers, a pro-Russian hacking group active since 2023, claimed responsibility for the attack on Telegram. The group said the operation against the Storting would last three hours.
Its claim has not been independently verified. A DDoS attack does not in itself indicate that hackers gained access to internal systems or obtained data. Instead, the method attempts to make an online service unavailable by directing large amounts of traffic towards it simultaneously.
Norway’s National Security Authority (Nasjonal sikkerhetsmyndighet, NSM) told VG it was aware of the incident. Andreas Skjøld-Lorange, a senior director at the agency, said DDoS attacks themselves should not be considered a threat to national security, although prolonged disruptions can affect confidence in public institutions.
Server Killers has targeted other Norwegian services
The attack against parliament follows a series of recent cyber incidents targeting Norwegian institutions.
Earlier in September, Server Killers claimed responsibility for DDoS attacks against several Norwegian universities and colleges, including the University of Oslo and OsloMet. The group has also claimed an attack against the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (Utlendingsdirektoratet, UDI), whose website became unavailable on 4 September.
In late August, several digital services used by Norway’s higher education sector were also disrupted by denial-of-service attacks.
Server Killers has described its campaign against Norway as a “cyberwar”, citing Norwegian support for Ukraine and defence cooperation with Kyiv as its motivation. The description is the group’s own and does not represent an assessment by Norwegian authorities.
DDoS attacks have become a recurring disruption
The NSM says denial-of-service attacks have become part of the normal cyber threat environment. Their impact can range from minor instability to outages lasting several days.
The attack on the Storting appears to have been limited to the availability of its public website. Norwegian authorities have not reported that parliamentary data or internal systems were compromised.
The incident nevertheless adds the country’s parliament to a growing list of Norwegian public institutions targeted by politically motivated cyber campaigns in recent weeks, as the country continues its military and political support for Ukraine.
