Hacker Groups Say Rosstat Leak Shows More Than 390,000 Russian Deaths Linked to Ukraine War
The Belarusian group Cyber Partisans BY and the Ukrainian group Silent Crow said they hacked Rosstat and obtained records on Russian military deaths linked to the war in Ukraine. Their estimates range from 393,881 to 450,100 deaths, but Bloomberg could not independently and cryptographically verify the database's authenticity.
Key points
- Cyber Partisans BY counted 393,881 deaths explicitly linked to combat actions or their consequences.
- Silent Crow estimated 450,100 deaths using a broader methodology.
- Journalists analyzed more than 11 million death certificates covering February 24, 2022, through the end of August 2026.
- The hackers said they stole about 23 terabytes of Rosstat data.
- Mediazona and the BBC Russian Service had identified about 286,000 Russian military deaths by name.
- Russia has not published official combat-loss statistics since September 2022.
Why it matters
The leak offers a potentially new way to assess Russian military losses in the absence of official Russian casualty statistics since September 2022. Its estimates are substantially higher than the roughly 286,000 names in the joint Mediazonа and BBC Russian Service database, although the named lists are incomplete. The stolen material also includes internal records that may reveal demographic, economic and military information beyond the reported death tolls. Exact figures remain uncertain because the database could not be independently cryptographically verified, death certificates do not always state the true cause of death, and registrations are delayed.
What happened
Cyber Partisans BY and Silent Crow said they carried out a large-scale breach of Rosstat, Russia's federal statistics agency, and obtained about 23 terabytes of data. The material reportedly includes internal documents, demographic and economic statistics, and information about Russian military losses. Journalists analyzed more than 11 million death certificates covering the period from February 24, 2022, to the end of August 2026. Cyber Partisans BY counted 393,881 people whose recorded cause of death was combat actions or their consequences. Silent Crow produced a broader estimate of 450,100, adding non-combat military deaths, deaths marked as terrorist attacks, and deaths of people registered in Russia who died in Ukraine or occupied territories without a specified cause. The publication of the datasets was not independently and cryptographically verified by Bloomberg, although journalists found no signs of fabrication and said the metadata matched a genuine data export. Rosstat did not respond to Bloomberg's requests for comment.
How Ukrainian sources describe it
Ukrainian coverage emphasizes the scale of the reported Russian death toll and contrasts it with Russia's refusal to publish official casualty statistics. The reports also highlight possible exposure of concealed Russian losses, the human cost of the war, mortality trends among Russian men, the concentration of deaths in eastern Ukraine, and the implications of rising losses for Russian reserves and state finances.
How international sources describe it
The available coverage, published by Ukrainian outlets, relies heavily on Bloomberg reporting, international media investigations and the hackers' own analysis. It stresses that the database's authenticity could not be independently and cryptographically verified, even though journalists found no evidence of fabrication and said its metadata was consistent with a genuine export. It also gives substantial weight to incomplete named lists, registration delays, inconsistent causes of death and differences between estimation methods.
Where reporting differs
The hacker groups use materially different definitions. Cyber Partisans BY counted 393,881 deaths tied to combat actions or their consequences, while Silent Crow estimated 450,100 by also including non-combat military deaths, deaths marked as terrorist attacks, and deaths registered in Russia that occurred in Ukraine or occupied territories without a specified cause. Estimates from other methods are lower: the joint named lists contained about 286,000 people, while Mediazonа and Meduza estimated about 350,000 military deaths by the end of 2025.
Background
Russia stopped publishing official combat-loss statistics in September 2022, and Rosstat stopped publishing annual data on causes of death in 2024. The joint Mediazonа and BBC Russian Service list contains about 286,000 established military deaths, while a separate Mediazonа and Meduza study estimated approximately 350,000 by the end of 2025. Registration delays have increased: the median time was roughly six weeks in the second half of 2023 and exceeded four months in 2025. In August 2026, more than 2,500 deaths from 2025 were added to the database, illustrating the lag in reporting.