Anonymous bomb threats targeting schools, kindergartens, hospitals, and other institutions were received in at least nine Russian regions on Sept. 1, according to a count by The Insider. Incidents were reported in the Leningrad, Perm, Kemerovo, and Orenburg regions, along with Tatarstan, the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, and the Altai, Zabaykalsky, and Krasnoyarsk krais. Some institutions were evacuated, but as of the time of publication, no explosive devices had been reported found.
Leningrad Region governor Alexander Drozdenko claims that dozens of schools, kindergartens, hospitals, and other social facilities received threats. He called what happened an “information terrorist attack.” According to him, the “enemy” is trying to sow panic by disrupting Knowledge Day — the traditional first day of school on Sept. 1. Drozdenko did not specify, however, who exactly sent the messages or how he arrived at the conclusion that there was a single organizer behind the threats.
In Tatarstan, medical institutions under the regional Health Ministry began receiving anonymous emails starting at 8:00 a.m. The hospitals underwent a partial evacuation but returned to normal operations after inspection. In the Altai Krai, patients and staff were evacuated from the regional diagnostic center, and the anti-terrorism commission reported a wave of threats against social, administrative, and educational institutions.
Authorities in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug stated that after the buildings had been inspected none of the threats had proven to be actionable. Bomb threats against schools, kindergartens, and hospitals were also received in the Perm Krai, the Kemerovo and Orenburg regions, and the Zabaykalsky and Krasnoyarsk krais. There has still been no evidence presented publicly indicating that the geographically dispersed threats came from the same sender or group of senders.
Meanwhile, several museum venues in Moscow suspended operations. The Pushkin Museum announced a temporary closure and canceled tours for a period of four hours, the Museum of the East closed its main building until approximately 1:00 p.m., and the Museum of Moscow and all its branches stopped admitting visitors until 2:00 p.m. The ROSIZO branch on Petroverigsky Lane also suspended the exhibition “Art Behind Closed Doors: Leningrad Apartment Exhibitions of the 1960s–1980s.” The Pushkin Museum, the Museum of the East, and ROSIZO cited “technical reasons,” while the Museum of Moscow cited “reasons beyond our control.” None of the institutions officially linked the closures to the wave of bomb threats.
The mass sending of false threats has happened in Russia before. In February 2020, unknown individuals reported bomb threats against more than 1,500 sites in Moscow in a single day, including schools, hospitals, courts, and every metro station in the city’s network. No bombs were found, but around 8,000 people had to be evacuated.
Also in 2020, at the request of the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, Roskomnadzor blocked access to Protonmail after the Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed its servers had been used to send threats to 830 sites. The FSB had previously blacklisted the Startmail service, which it claimed had been used to send more than 1,000 bomb threat emails targeting over 16,000 sites. Russian security agencies have not yet named the parties responsible for the current wave of messages.
