Delta military program dnr joker hack
© The Joker DNR/TelegramScreenshot of the "Joker" announcing the Delta hack
On 1 November 2022, the Telegram channel Joker DNR announced that it had hacked the 'Delta' programme currently used by Ukraine to coordinate its troops in the conflict against the Russian armed forces. This hacking is a perfect example of why relying on technology in military matters may not only be a panacea, but also a potential source of disaster.

A month ago, I published an article on the possibilities of evolution and improvement of the Russian army that I envisaged in the context of the ongoing conflict. After publication, I received many comments, including from my Russian colleagues. While some of them agreed with several of my proposals, I had a lengthy discussion with one of them about the fact that the Russian army lacked the high-tech coordination systems that the Ukrainian army has thanks to US support (see video below).

soldiers computer tablets field battle
Soldiers using military software in the field
For him, this lack of real-time interactive maps, plotters, and other electronic systems was a handicap for the Russian army. For my part, I pointed out that these systems are fragile, that their operation can be prevented by multiple factors, that their security is difficult to maintain and that they are therefore a panacea only as long as everything works perfectly.


In this video, a Ukrainian soldier brags about modern technology and software. He humiliates the Russians and says they are a long way from such technology. I am very ashamed of the Russians. Very much. How they can be so backward and stupid just doesn't fit in my insane but genius head. Go to sleep with these thoughts, and when you wake up, I'll explain to you what's really going on. Tomorrow everyone will be ashamed of what smug suckers the Ukrainian soldiers and the clowns ruling them are after all. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha... Well, except Zelensky. Zelensky is not a sucker. He's 44 years old now. I will humiliate you tomorrow. Don't switch. ะั…-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ-ั…ะฐ... Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

But there are many ways in which such systems can fail or backfire on the army that uses them. Signal jamming, recovery by the enemy of tracers installed on vehicles, battery failure, lack of electricity (a major problem in Ukraine at the moment), computer bugs, failure of a technical component, hacking, etc.

And the events of the following weeks proved my point. Just a few days after the publication of my article, Ukrainian soldiers reported communication problems with the Starlink system, which is used to coordinate the movements of Ukrainian troops via satellite internet link. As a result, the above-mentioned coordination of troops was already beginning to falter.

The final blow came from the Joker DNR channel, which announced that it had hacked into and taken control of the "Delta" programme used to coordinate Ukrainian troops on the ground. And when I say "taken control", that's really what it's about.


I've started to write that somehow there aren't enough objects and you can't see all the opposing sides. Then here's more, just to illustrate the point. I wonder if American commanders will guess that their DELTA might also get in trouble thanks to Ukrainian clowns? Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha....

By the way, it's a very handy interface. I gave you a lot of new intelligence information there. I can't vouch for the accuracy, it's from my head. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha...

In several posts published on 1 November 2022, the DNR Joker shows how he walks around the Delta system, displaying the data there, and explaining that the Russians also had access to it.

"Ukrainian soldiers boast about computer programs and mock those in Donetsk who use paper maps. I decided to set the record straight. While the Ukrainians regularly fill their databases with software donated by their American masters, we don't even have to invent or install anything, we just use their online software. It's very convenient and cheap. I want to stress that I am talking about ALL their programs. Now you know why you've been having a lot of problems lately," he wrote in the introduction to the first post.

Now this programme contains the positions of Ukrainian troops, their drones, their military equipment, their vehicles, all of which are tracked by GPS through plotters! Need I explain that all the little icons marked as Ukrainian troops on the Delta program turned into targets for Russian artillery, missile system crews, and aerospace forces? Clearly, the Delta programme once hacked turned into an ultra-accurate mega-spy for the Russian armed forces. Now that's what I call scoring against your side!

And that's not all. In its first message, Joker DNR also claims to have changed data in the Delta programme, to have access to other programmes used by Kiev, and to have infected all computers connected to the system. Clearly, Ukraine can no longer rely on the data in the Delta programme (friendly troops may have been marked as enemies and vice versa) or in other such programmes, and data leaks can continue even after the security flaws have been fixed, via infected computers. As Joker DNR says in the conclusion of his post, "sometimes it's better to use paper maps".

Unsurprisingly, the Ukrainian army claims that there was no hacking, while Ukrainian journalist Yuri Boutoussov says that there was one, but that the flaw has been repaired (when propaganda blunders like this, it means that the lies have not been properly coordinated). It must be said that the blunder is significant, because the Delta program is also used by the American instructors who supervise the Ukrainian troops!

In view of what happened with the "high-tech" coordination of the Ukrainian troops, it is easier to understand why Russia preferred to stick to the good old paper maps that have been tried and tested for a long time, why it was right not to embark on this costly experiment, and why I did not recommend doing so.