Russia started an invasion of Ukraine on three fronts on February 24, “bombarding cities, towns, and villages” as soldiers pushed into Kyiv, the capital of the Eastern European country.
Anonymous, a well-known international hacker collective, has launched a cyberwar against Russia, suspected of carrying out its cyber strikes on Ukraine. President Biden has also been presented with options for “massive cyber attacks” on Russia to complicate the invasion.
Russia has been blamed for damaging Ukraine’s cybersecurity in addition to its military assault, according to reports. The claimed cyber assaults on Ukraine’s banking system and government comprised malware that can wipe clean data from any targeted business, as well as a DDoS attack on Wednesday, February 23, that damaged the websites of Ukrainian government agencies and financial institutions.
The Russian Embassy in the United States slammed the government’s “baseless statements,” claiming that “Russia has nothing to do with the mentioned events” and that “Russia has never conducted and does not conduct any malicious operations in cyberspace.”
Anonymous has engaged the cyberwar in support of Ukraine, saying on February 24 that it is “officially in cyberwar against the Russian government.” The group stated the next day that the Russian Ministry of Defense’s website was down.
The organisation rushed to Twitter to claim responsibility for attacking Russian websites. On February 26, the organisation requested that Russian President Vladimir Putin “restore the rights of the Ukrainian people and resign as an elected official” in a video addressed to Putin.
“Anonymous has ongoing operations to keep .ru government websites offline and to push information to the Russian people so they can be free of Putin’s state censorship machine,” the group posted. “We also have ongoing operations to keep the Ukrainian people online as best we can.”
On February 26, Anonymous said it hacked into Russians’ TVs to broadcast the “reality of what is happening in Ukraine.” Ukraine is not the only government feeling the threat of potential cyber-attacks. Several world leaders have issued warnings and worries of a possible “cyberwar.”
“Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine, which cyber attacks have accompanied on the Ukrainian government and critical infrastructure organizations, may have consequences for our own nation’s critical infrastructure, a potential we’ve been warning about for months,” the agency said.
Although there are “no specific or credible threats to the US homeland at this time,” the agency is aware of “the potential for Russia’s destabilising actions.”
CISA advised every organization to be “prepared to respond to disruptive cyber activity.”
