Hackers claim 450100 Russians killed in the war: “Cyber Partisans” name at least 393881

The hacker group Silent Crow has claimed that 450100 Russians have died in the war against Ukraine since February 2022. The Belarusian group "Cyber Partisans", which the Belarusian authorities have designated "extremist", puts the figure by its own count at no fewer than 393881 dead Russian servicemen by the end of August 2026. Both groups say they rely on data obtained by hacking Rosstat. These claims cannot be verified independently.

Silent Crow reached its figure by adding to the main number the non-combat deaths of servicemen (14160), killed civilians and records of death with no cause given. Among such records registered in Russia and relating to the occupied territories or Ukraine, there are 13671. Of these, the group estimates possible military deaths in a range from 3734 to 9118 people. Silent Crow said it obtained the databases of the "Demography" information system, which hold data on the population and causes of death.

The "Cyber Partisans" assert that their figure, almost 394 thousand, "reflects the minimum of confirmed dead as a result of combat operations on the Russian side alone".

According to Silent Crow, the largest number of dead, about 100 thousand or 21.7%, comes from the Volga Federal District. More than half, 54.9%, died in the Donetsk region. The losses, by the hackers' count, grew every year: about 19 thousand in 2022, more than 42 thousand in 2023, almost 110 thousand in 2024 and more than 182 thousand in 2025. For the incomplete year 2026 the group counted about 40 thousand more and forecasts between 508 and 543 thousand dead by the end of the year.

The name-by-name lists kept by Mediazona, the BBC Russian Service and volunteers using open sources contained the names of 285023 dead servicemen as of 30 October, and 285881 by 7 November. A joint estimate by Meduza and Mediazona based on the Register of Inheritance Cases put the number of dead at the end of 2025 at about 350 thousand.

Estimates by military officials and analysts are higher. The Economist believes that by the end of October up to 770 thousand Russian servicemen had been killed, and that total losses, including the wounded, came to 2.1 million. In September the head of the UK Defence Staff, Richard Knighton, spoke of more than half a million dead and 1.5 million casualties including the wounded. The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine puts total losses in killed and wounded above 1.6 million. The CSIS centre estimated losses from February 2022 to December 2025 at about 1.2 million killed, wounded and missing, and the Russian General Staff counted 1208970 people as of the same date, without specifying how many of them were killed.

According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, in October 2026 Russia lost 54400 servicemen killed and wounded, which is 5730, or 11.8%, more than the previous record of December 2024, 48670. Bloomberg, citing European intelligence services, gives 54 thousand for October.

The hackers' claims match none of the estimates cited: they are higher than the lists of names but lower than the estimates of The Economist and the British military. The "Cyber Partisans" data on a minimum of dead and Silent Crow's count, which adds records with no cause of death, use different methods, and neither has been independently checked.

Since 2022 more and more statistics, including mortality data, have been disappearing from public access in Russia. In July 2026 the Supreme Court of Russia designated Silent Crow and "Cyber Partisans BY" as extremist. Around the same time the groups claimed responsibility for hacking Aeroflot's systems.

The aim of the "Cyber Partisans", according to earlier reports, is to change Lukashenka's government and to help Ukraine. In 2022 they helped Ukraine with cyberattacks.