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Russian hackers have been in control of the Ukrainian telecommunications giant since May 2023

Politiko 2024-01-04 12:43:45

Russian hackers have been in control of the Ukrainian telecommunications giant

Russian hackers were inside the system of Ukrainian telecommunications giant Kyivstar at least since May last year in a cyber attack that should serve as a "big warning" to the West, Ukraine's cyber espionage chief told Reuters .

The hack, one of the most dramatic since Russia's full-scale invasion nearly two years ago, knocked out services provided by Ukraine's largest telecommunications operator to some 24 million users for several days from December 12.

In an interview, Illia Vitiuk, head of the cyber security department of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), revealed exclusive details about the hack.

"This attack is a big message, a big warning, not only for Ukraine, but for the whole Western world to understand that no one is really invulnerable," he said.

He noted that Kyivstar was a wealthy, private company that invested heavily in cyber security.

The attack wiped out "almost everything," including thousands of virtual servers and PCs, he said, describing it as perhaps the first example of a devastating cyber attack that "completely destroyed the core of a telecommunications operator."

During its investigation, the SBU found that hackers probably tried to break into Kyivstar in March or earlier, he said in a Zoom interview on December 27.

"At the moment, we can say with certainty that they were in the system at least since May 2023," he said. 

The SBU estimated that the hackers would have been able to steal personal information, figure out phone locations, intercept SMS messages and possibly steal Telegram accounts with the level of access they gained, he said.

 

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