UPDATED 21:31 EDT / FEBRUARY 15 2022

SECURITY

Ukrainian websites knocked offline ahead of possible Russian invasion

The world faces what could turn out to be World War III, as Russian troops mass on the border with Ukraine and could invade the sovereign country this week — but Russia apparently is already marching on the internet.

The best way to start an invasion is to cripple the internet and online functionality of the country you’re about to invade, and that’s exactly what is now happening in Ukraine. According to the Associated Press, a series of cyberattacks has knocked out the websites of the Ukrainian army, the defense ministry and major banks. The report claims that the sites were knocked offline via a distributed denial-of-service attack while adding that the DDoS might be “a smokescreen for more damaging cyber mischief.”

“As the largest Ukrainian state-owned bank was affected, the escalating Ukraine-Russia crisis again shows the power of state actors to inflict far-reaching disruption,” Quentin Wineteer Sr., federal program manager at security intelligence company LogRhythm Inc., told SiliconANGLE. “Thankfully, the outcome was just disruption and not loss in this instance. This is an emphatic reminder to global companies of the need to take a deep look at their information security posture, draw from internal security resources or lean on partnerships from industry leaders who are ready to defend against the cyberthreats of the modern world.”

Rick Holland, chief information security officer and vice president Strategy at digital risk protection firm Digital Shadows Ltd., noted that “threat actors with Russian affiliations have certainly leveraged massive DDoS attacks in the past, as we saw in Estonia in 2007.”

“Those attacks crippled the Estonian economy, but thus far, the DDoS attacks against the Ukrainian defense ministry and financial institutions appear to be harassment similar to the previous DDoS attacks seen in January,” Holland added. “They could be a precursor to a significant attack or a component of a broader campaign to intimidate and confuse Ukraine.”

Photo: mil.ru/Wikiemedia Commons

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