Ukraine said on Sunday that all indications were that Russia was involved in a recent massive cyber-attack that hit the websites of several Ukrainian ministries. Microsoft has warned that the cyber-attack may be much more serious than originally thought.
“All the evidence shows that Russia is behind the cyber attack. “Moscow continues to wage a hybrid war,” the Ukrainian ministry of digital reform said in a statement.
The ministry called on Ukrainians not to panic, saying their personal data was protected.
The aim of the attack, the statement added, “is only to intimidate society. “But also to destabilize the situation in Ukraine, to suspend work in the public sector and to undermine the confidence of Ukrainians in the authorities.”
Earlier, the Kremlin denied the allegations, saying there was no evidence that Russia was behind the attack.
“It’s nothing to do with it. “Russia has nothing to do with these cyber-attacks,” Dmitry Peshkov, a spokesman for President Vladimir Putin, told CNN.
“Ukrainians are blaming Russia for everything, even the bad weather in their country,” he said in English.
Late Friday, Kiev announced that it had some “preliminary indications” that a possible involvement of the Russian secret services in the massive cyber attack.
A total of 70 government websites were targeted in the attacks on Thursday night, according to the Ukrainian security service SBU. Their contents “were not modified and there was no leakage of personal data”, the SBU assured.
For some time the Foreign Ministry website posted a message in Ukrainian, Russian and Polish saying “fear and expect the worst”.
Within hours of the breach, the security service announced that access to most of the affected websites had been restored and that the damage was minor.
However, Microsoft warned on Sunday that the cyber attack could prove more destructive and affect more organizations than originally thought.
The US software giant noted that it continues to analyze malware and warned that this could make government digital infrastructure inoperable.
“Malware, which is designed to look like a ransomware but does not have a ransom recovery mechanism, aims to be more destructive and is designed to make targeted devices non-functional rather than ransom,” Microsoft said in a post. in a blog.
According to the company, no culprit has been identified so far but the company warns that the number of organizations affected may be higher than originally thought.
“Our research teams have detected malware on dozens of affected systems, and that number could grow as our research continues. These systems run through many governmental, non-governmental and other IT organizations, all based in Ukraine. “We do not know the current stage of the attacker’s cycle or how many other victims may be in Ukraine or in other geographical locations,” Microsoft said.
Senior government official Victor Zora told AFP on Friday that the cyber-attack was one of the largest in recent years.
Ukraine has been targeted by hackers several times in recent years, with attacks attributed to Russia, such as in 2017, against various critical infrastructure and in 2015, against an electricity transmission network.
Ukraine-Russia relations are more tense than ever, with Kiev accusing Moscow of having an army on its border with a view to a possible invasion. Some analysts fear that the cyber-attack may be the prelude to a military strike.
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