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Coronavirus
Bulgaria

COVID Chaos In Bulgaria: One Reporter Is Tired Of Asking “Why”

With much attention now focused on rising COVID-19 cases in the UK and Moscow's new lockdown, a hidden story is in Bulgaria, which claims both Europe's highest death rate and lowest vaccination rate. By now, this reporter knows the drill…

Photo of two women wearing COVID protective masks walking in the city center of Bulgaria's capital, Sofia

Walking in Sofia, Bulgaria, on Oct. 9

Artur Widak/NurPhoto/ZUMA
CoronavirusSourcesWORLDCRUNCHBulgariaSocietyCountries
Carl-Johan Karlsson

SOFIA — I suspected, while Google translating the Bulgarian news Wednesday morning, that I might be the last person in Sofia with an internet connection to have found out about the new COVID rules.Following reports of 4,979 new COVID-19 cases and 214 coronavirus-related deaths on Tuesday, the Bulgarian government had announced that proof of vaccine or negative PCR tests will be required for access to restaurants, theaters, cinemas, gyms, clubs and shopping malls. Starting tomorrow.

I'd heard some chatter at the co-working place the night before, but after 18 months of coronavirus reporting, and pandemic living, both in my native Sweden and my former home in Paris, I wasn't up for another round on the topic.


The world's highest mortality rate

Perhaps, that same plague fatigue was what caused me — when deciding to set up shop in Bulgaria a month ago — to miss the detail that this is both Europe's least vaccinated country and the one with the highest COVID-19 mortality rate.

I had chosen Sofia (Europe's oldest city!) on the latest stop of my now 12-year hunt for a place to sort of settle down for its cheap rent, cobblestoned city center … and its excellent nationwide WiFi. What more could you ask?

Well, vaccinations, it turned out. So here I was facing the COVID story again, after months exploring France's extra strict lockdown measures, Sweden's famous flirt with herd immunity, the mask morality police and anti-vaxx ideologues everywhere.

Photo of people wearing COVID protective masks in Sofia, Bulgaria

Inside a tram in Sofia, Bulgaria

Artur Widak/NurPhoto/ZUMA

Pandemic fatigue

The world's pandemic press this week is focused on the UK, where again cases are skyrocketing, and Moscow's new lockdown. But here in a country of barely 7 million, where I didn't speak the language or know the history, what might I find? After just six weeks, I considered the social dispositions I had discerned, what political leanings I'd nosed out that might explain why 80% of the population still isn't vaccinated.

Where does a hungry reporter go?

I had, for example, observed with great interest that Sofians never jaywalk. Maybe that was the angle? The striking incongruence between social conformity and vaccine refusal? Or maybe the upcoming parliamentary elections held a clue to the bad COVID management.

To answer these questions, I went where any hungry reporter would go: the burger joint on the corner.

- "So new restrictions huh? You think they might lockdown?"

- "Dunno. The usual? No chili?"

- "Right, no chili … So you think more people will get vaccinated now?"

- "We'll see. That'll be four leva."

Having spent the past 18 months among the army of finger-wagging, number-crunching armchair social scientists (both in and out of print) I had suddenly lost my hunger to "explain" why Bulgarians were the world's bad boy of the moment on the COVID front. Consider this just one roving reporter's version of pandemic fatigue.

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FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
pro-ukrainian hacker

How Pro-Ukrainian Hackers Have Undermined Russia's War Every Step Of The Way

Authorities in Moscow continue to struggle to stem the tide of data breaches from hackers inside and outside Ukraine, who have been one of the unsung heroes in the resistance to the Russian invasion.

Screenshot of a masked Ukrainian "hacktivist"

A masked Ukrainian "hacktivist" in a video posted by hacking groups Falcons Flame and Trinity

Falcons Flame and Trinity YouTube screenshot
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine WarRussiaUkraineFutureSourcesVazhnyye Istorii/Important StoriesCountries
Lizaveta Tsybulina

Updated Nov. 20, 2023 at 5:45 p.m.

It was a concerted effort that began with Russia's Feb. 24, 2022 full-scale invasion, and has not relented since: pro-Ukrainian hackers have been targeting Russian government agencies and businesses, gathering secret information and passing it on to the Ukrainian security and intelligence forces.

Discrepancies exist in total reported breakthroughs and leaks obtained over the past 20 months. This year so far, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s digital watchdog, identified 150 major leaks, while Kaspersky Lab, a Russian cybersecurity firm, reported 168 leaks, totaling about 2 billion lines of data, including 48 million with top secret passwords.

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Following the Russian invasion, a substantial number of hackers worldwide expressed solidarity with Ukraine, and took action. "My colleagues and I operate under the principle that 'if it can be hacked, then it needs to be hacked,'” said a representative of the Cyber.Anarchy.Squad group. “We believe in targeting anything accessible, especially if it's significant to defeating the enemy."

“BlackBird,” one of the founders of the DC8044 community, explained that the primary objective of hacking Russian entities is to acquire data useful to Ukrainian security forces.

"The personal data obtained by our groups is typically shared with security forces,” he said. “They aggregate and analyze this information to support their operations effectively.”

Hackers closely cooperate with Ukrainian intelligence services as well: they are engaged in reconnaissance, sabotage and information operations. Andrey Baranovich, co-founder of the Ukrainian CyberAlliance group said that “If we spend 24 hours hacking something, our victims should spend at least a week recovering, and in the optimal case, the victim should not recover at all.”

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