Tag Archive for: Ukraine’s

Ukraine’s cyber chief on the ever-changing digital war with Russia

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Russian hackers have been attacking Ukraine for over a decade, but until the war began, cyberattacks still seemed like something out of a science fiction movie for ordinary Ukrainians. Many had to learn how to safeguard their hardware and their data.

The agency responsible for raising awareness for cybersecurity in society, private businesses, and the government is called Derzhspetszvyazok, or the State Service of Special Communications and Information Protection of Ukraine (SSSCIP).

Its chief, Yurii Shchyhol, faced the difficult task of explaining Russia’s digital threat to Ukrainians and the rest of the world.

His agency also oversees the coordination of all Ukrainian state services responsible for digital security and establishing a relationship with private businesses, which have become a lucrative target for Russian hackers.

One year into the war, his job hasn’t gotten any easier. Russian hackers are continually adapting and enhancing their methods, while also searching for fresh targets, Shchyhol said in an interview with The Record.

And as Ukraine and Russia gear up for expected spring and summer operations, Shchyhol expects Russia to intensify its cyberattacks. His objective now is not only to defend against attacks but also to hold those responsible accountable and bring them to justice.

“This is not a war between soldiers. It’s a war between the aggressor nation and the civilian population. The majority of Russian missiles target innocent civilians, and the same is happening in cyberspace,” Shchyhol said.

In a Zoom interview conducted in Ukrainian, The Record asked him about the current state of cyberwarfare in Ukraine one year after the invasion and his expectations for the near future. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

The Record: How have Russian cyberattacks on Ukraine changed since the beginning of 2023?

Yurii Shchyhol: Russian cyberattacks on Ukraine are ongoing, but hackers are changing their attack vectors and targets.

In 2023, cyberattacks on Ukrainian commerce, finance, and defense sectors have significantly decreased. Hackers may have lost interest in these areas because they cannot quickly find vulnerabilities there that they can…

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Meet the hacker armies on Ukraine’s cyber front line

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  • By Joe Tidy
  • Cyber correspondent

When Russia initiated its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a second, less visible battle in cyberspace got under way. The BBC’s cyber correspondent Joe Tidy travelled to Ukraine to speak to those fighting the cyber war, and found the conflict has blurred the lines between those working for the military and the unofficial activist hackers.

When I went to visit Oleksandr in his one-bedroom flat in central Ukraine, I found a typically spartan set-up common to many hackers.

No furniture or home comforts – not even a TV – just a powerful computer in one corner of his bedroom and a powerful music system in the other.

From here, Oleksandr has helped temporarily disable hundreds of Russian websites, disrupted services at dozens of banks and defaced websites with pro-Ukraine messages.

He is one of the most prominent hackers in the vigilante group, the IT Army of Ukraine – a volunteer hacking network with a Telegram group nearly 200,000-strong.

For more than a year, he has devoted himself to causing as much chaos in Russia as possible.

Even during our visit he was running complex software attempting to take his latest target – a Russian banking website – offline.

Ironically though, he admits the idea for his favourite hack actually began with a tip from an anonymous Russian, who told them about an organisation called Chestny Znak – Russia’s only product authentication system.

He was told all goods produced in Russia – including fresh food – have to be scanned for a unique number and a barcode supplied by the company from the moment of their creation at a factory, up till the moment of being sold.

Oleksandr smiles as he describes how he and his team found a way to take the service offline, using a hacking tool that floods a computer system with internet traffic – known as a targeted DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) attack.

“The economic losses were pretty high, I think. It was mind-blowing,” says Oleksandr.

Image caption,

Oleksandr says he is not scared of Russian reprisals and refuses to hide his identity

In reality, it’s hard to gauge the disruption prompted by the hack, but for four days last April Chestny Znak posted regular updates about the DDoS…

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Ukraine’s year of war exposes changing roles for cyber weapons

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On the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion, Ukraine is commemorating horrific losses — and remarkable defiance.

The country’s fierce resistance on the battlefield has been echoed on the digital front — where Kyiv has unique experience. The conflict with Russia has become the world’s first full-scale cyberwar, but Ukraine was a test bed for digital weapons long before the invasion of 24 February, 2022. Since Putin’s troops began flooding across the border, the cyber tactics have shifted dramatically.

These developments have made Ukraine a bellwether for digital warfare. And to the surprise of analysts, cyber attacks have had a limited impact over the past year.

“We’re going to see cyber activity as a pre-emptive tactic to physical war.

In the lead-up to the invasion, cyber assaults were prominent. On 15 February, Russian hackers launched the most powerful DDoS attack in the history of Ukraine. A day before the full-scale invasion, several government and banking websites were struck once again.

Yet in the months that followed, reports of major cyberattacks declined. Zachary Warren, Chief Security Advisor EMEA at Tanium and a regular advisor to NATO, regards this as a portent for digital warfare.

“Moving forward, we’re going to see cyber activity as a pre-emptive tactic to physical war… it’s a tool to weaken a target before moving in,” he said.

Ukraine’s government, meanwhile, asserts that Russia’s targets have changed. In a January report, security officials said the cyberattacks initially centred on Ukraine’s communication department, which aimed to disrupt military and government operations. But after Russia’s first defeat at the front, the focus shifted to maximising damage to civilians.

Notably, the officials found that all the assaults had harnessed previously known techniques.

“The attacks used by Russia have long been categorised and have straightforward solutions for counteraction,” said the report’s authors.

Infographic detailing a cyber-overview of the conflict in 2022