With an unprecedented appeal, the Ukrainian Ministry of Digital Transition asked hackers around the world to attack Russian, digital targets. Many rushed.
Before leaving for work, Jens from Denmark spends a few hours defending Ukraine in cyberspace. The 40-year-old IT specialist monitors Russian target websites via Telegram and then “bombs” them. These are websites of Russian organizations and companies. The ultimate goal of the Danish hacker is to crash these websites.
“I am doing this to punish the Russians for the war crimes they are committing,” he told DW in an encrypted message. Maintaining anonymity is essential in such conversations.
The number of pro-Ukrainian “cyber guerrillas” is unknown. Their motives and the digital weapons they use are different and highly sophisticated. What unites them is the common goal: to support Ukraine.
Digital guerrilla warfare
Cyber ​​warfare has been known for decades as a form of warfare aimed at undermining the enemy or extracting sensitive information or simply causing confusion. But the war in Ukraine has sparked an unprecedented “digital guerrilla war.” According to the hackers, these are people who act independently by launching cyber attacks without coordination from a central authority.
The idea of ​​”recruiting” volunteer hackers was born in late February, when the war broke out in Ukraine. According to Ukrainian businessman and IT systems expert Yegor Ausev, with the launch of the first Russian missiles in Ukraine, cybersecurity experts approached the Ukrainian government to offer their assistance. “Our only motivation is to stop this war,” Aussef told DW, speaking from a location near Kyiv. He even estimates that a month after the Russian invasion, about 1,000 hackers are active in favor of Ukraine. The Ukrainian expert estimates that many are probably cooperating with a nucleus of the Ukrainian army in order to gather information about Russia.
The role of Anonymous and the criminal dimension
However, since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, the international hacker movement Anonymous has also played an active role, declaring a “cyber war against the Russian government” via twitter. According to two Anonymous members of DW, hundreds of hackers are launching advanced cyber attacks. Less “advanced” hackers send messages to random numbers through a specialized website, affecting the dissemination of information. Finally, there is the category of hackers with little knowledge, who rushed to help, but did not fully understand how the hacker software works.
However, at a time when the Ukrainian government has embraced “cyber-guerrillas”, experts warn that such practices are dangerous. This is because non-war-related targets could be hit or digitally retaliated by even more sophisticated hackers.
“Any such attack could worsen the situation,” said Dennis Kenji Kipker, a professor of law and digital security in Bremen. As he points out, many hackers do not even know that many of their actions are illegal. This is definitely the belief of the Danish hacker Jens, who declares himself a “law-abiding citizen” who in peacetime would not do what he is doing now. As he puts it: “There is a war going on and I think I am fighting, like many others, in the digital army of Ukraine.”
Janos Delker
Edited by: Dimitra Kyranoudi
Source: Deutsche Welle
Source: Capital
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