Security News
The U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday announced sanctions against four current and former Ukrainian government officials for engaging in "Russian government-directed influence activities" in the country, including gathering sensitive information about its critical infrastructure. The agency said the four individuals were involved in different roles as part of a concerted influence campaign to destabilize the nation, while also accusing Russia's national security authority, the Federal Security Service, of recruiting Ukrainians in key positions to create instability.
The U.S. Treasury Department announced today sanctions against Volodymyr Oliynyk, a former Ukrainian official, for collecting and sharing info on critical Ukrainian infrastructure with Russia's Federal Security Service."As in previous Russian incursions into Ukraine, repeated cyber operations against Ukraine's critical infrastructure are part of Russia's hybrid tactics to threaten Ukraine."
US companies should be on the lookout for security nasties from Ukrainian partners following the digital graffiti and malware attack launched against Ukraine by Belarus, the CISA has warned. "If working with Ukrainian organizations, take extra care to monitor, inspect, and isolate traffic from those organizations; closely review access controls for that traffic," added CISA, which also advised reviewing backups and disaster recovery drills.
Cybersecurity teams from Microsoft on Saturday disclosed they identified evidence of a new destructive malware operation targeting government, non-profit, and information technology entities in Ukraine amid brewing geopolitical tensions between the country and Russia. "The malware is disguised as ransomware but, if activated by the attacker, would render the infected computer system inoperable," Tom Burt, corporate vice president of customer security and trust at Microsoft, said, adding the intrusions were aimed at government agencies that provide critical executive branch or emergency response functions.
The government of Ukraine on Sunday formally accused Russia of masterminding the attacks that targeted websites of public institutions and government agencies this past week. "All the evidence points to the fact that Russia is behind the cyber attack," the Ministry of Digital Transformation said in a statement.
No fewer than 70 websites operated by the Ukrainian government went offline on Friday for hours in what appears to be a coordinated cyber attack amid heightened tensions with Russia. "As a result of a massive cyber attack, the websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a number of other government agencies are temporarily down," Oleg Nikolenko, MFA spokesperson, tweeted.
At least 15 websites belonging to various Ukrainian public institutions were compromised, defaced, and subsequently taken offline. As a result of a massive cyber attack, the websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a number of other government agencies are temporarily down.
Cyberattackers brought down around 70 Ukrainian government websites on Friday, defacing the site of the foreign ministry with a message to "Be afraid and expect the worst." NEWS IN KYIV: Several Ukrainian government websites down due to a major a cyberattack.
Ukrainian police have arrested five people on suspicion of operating a ransomware gang, including a husband-and-wife team, following tipoffs from UK law enforcement. The gang is said to have operated private VPNs, masking users' IP addresses so they could "Secretly carry out illegal activities." British bank card holders were then targeted by the crims, who used stolen details to make online purchases.
The U.S. government on Monday charged a Ukrainian suspect, arrested in Poland last month, with deploying REvil ransomware to target multiple businesses and government entities in the country, including perpetrating the attack against software company Kaseya, marking the latest action to crack down on the cybercrime group and curb further attacks. In another major development, the Justice Department disclosed the seizure of $6.1 million in alleged ransomware payments received by Russian national Yevgeniy Polyanin, who is currently at large and has been accused of conducting REvil ransomware attacks against multiple businesses and government entities in Texas dating back to August 16, 2019.