He introduces himself as Mikhail Andropov, leader of an organization called «Vilayat of Misoginistan». It is the signature that appeared in the threatening emails that triggered bomb alerts in hundreds of Italian schools on November 11, causing evacuations and checks by the police. But who hides behind this name? And above all, does the group that claims the threats really exist?
For the moment, there are no answers. However, there are some precedents that connect the Italian affair to a wider sequence of alarms which in recent days has affected airports, commercial flights and European television broadcasters.
Who is Mikhail Andropov and the reference to the former head of the KGB
The identity of the alleged Mikhail Andropov has not been established. The surname recalls Yurij Andropov, a historic Soviet leader who led the KGB from 1967 to 1982, before becoming general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
However, it is not possible to establish whether the reference is intentional, nor whether behind the signature is a single person, an organized group or someone using an invented identity.
The name had already appeared on November 6, when the editorial offices of the Irish public television RTÉ and the Bulgarian broadcaster Nova TV received emails with attack threats. The sender, introducing himself as Mikhail Andropov, also claimed responsibility for the previous wave of false bomb scares on European flights.
Reuters stated that it had not been able to verify the identity of the sender, the origin of the messages and the possible common origin of the threats to televisions and planes.
What is the Vilayat of Misoginistan
Even the name of the organization has unique characteristics. «Vilayat» is a term indicating a province or an administrative subdivision, also used in the nomenclature of some jihadist organizations.
«Misoginistan» instead appears as an artificial construction that combines the reference to misogyny with the geographical suffix «-stan», common in the names of several Central Asian countries.
There is no independent evidence of the existence of a terrorist organization identifiable with this name. Its presence in the emails does not demonstrate any connection with actually existing jihadist organizations.
The previous one from November 2: same message, different signature
A particularly significant element emerges from the comparison with the threats received by Italian schools on 2 November.
According to Adnkronos, an email was sent to 271 educational institutions that day. The text was substantially identical to that of 11 November, but the sender presented himself as belonging to the “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps”.
Nine days later, the same content reappeared with the signature of Mikhail Andropov and the Vilayat of Misoginistan.
The circumstance shows how the claims can be re-proposed using different identities, without however demonstrating that the authors of the two campaigns are the same.
Threats to airports and the Russian Male State movement
Another episode dates back to November 5, when airlines and airport managers in Rome and Milan received threats signed by the “Fighters of the Male State”.
The name recalls Male State, a Russian ultranationalist and misogynist movement founded in 2016 by Vladislav Pozdnyakov and declared extremist in 2021 by the Nizhny Novgorod regional court.
Pozdnyakov denied involvement in the threats. According to Meduza, he also claimed that he had no ties to Male State since 2019 and that the movement would cease to exist in 2021. His statements have not been independently verified.
There is no publicly verified evidence of a connection between this movement, the alleged Mikhail Andropov and the authors of the emails sent to schools.
Taiwanese dominance and warnings in the UK too
According to what was reported by Repubblica, the message that arrived at Italian schools on November 11th apparently comes from an address attributable to the domain of Dayeh University in Taiwan.
This element, however, does not allow us to establish where the email was actually sent, nor who the author was. The sender’s address can in fact be falsified or used abusively.
On the same day, similar threats also affected schools in the United Kingdom, causing numerous evacuations, especially in Scotland. According to STV News, around 470 schools in Scotland were the recipients of the messages. Communications also reached institutions in Northern Ireland.
Police Scotland said it considered the messages lacking credibility and had launched investigations to identify their source. However, an operational connection with the Italian emails has not been established.
Hybrid warfare or false alarms? The experts’ hypotheses
The succession of threats has fueled the fear of possible destabilization operations and hybrid warfare in Europe, but there are no conclusive elements that allow this specific campaign to be attributed to a foreign state.
Moscow has denied any involvement in previous threats to European flights. The possibilities considered by the experts cited by Reuters also include episodes of emulation, personal grudges and deliberate attempts to direct suspicion towards external parties.
In Italy, according to Quotidiano Nazionale, among the hypotheses under consideration there is also a coordinated action of procuring alarm, carried out through techniques of falsification of email addresses.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has called a meeting for 4pm on 11 November at Palazzo Chigi with the deputy prime ministers Matteo Salvini and Antonio Tajani, the ministers Matteo Piantedosi and Guido Crosetto, the undersecretary Alfredo Mantovano, the heads of intelligence and the National Cybersecurity Agency.
The Prime Minister declared that, from the checks carried out up to that point, no elements had emerged that would make the danger announced in the messages concrete.
The point still to be clarified is who actually sent the threats. Because, behind high-sounding names and apparently terrorist claims, there could be a reality very different from what the authors want us to believe.