Russian hackers launched malicious code to attack Ukraine?

More than half a decade ago, the famous Russian hacker group Sandworm attacked a power transmission station in Kyiv in 2016. Using a piece of malicious code to interact directly with the substation’s circuit breaker and blackout a small part of the capital of Ukraine.

Recently, the Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) and the Slovak cybersecurity company ESET have issued a warning about the Sandworm hacker group continuing to target high-voltage substations. so in Ukraine.

Sandworm is a world-famous hacker group identified as Unit 74455 of the GRU military intelligence agency of Russia. The group is believed to have masterminded attacks on Ukrainian energy stations in 2015 and 2016.

The new malware that carried out the recent attack is a variant of the 2016 malware called Industroyer2. ESET and CERT-UA said the malicious code was distributed and installed on the computer system of a Ukrainian energy company. Fortunately, the attack was detected early and prevented without leaving any great consequences.

Both CERT-UA and ESET declined to say what damage the attack caused. However, according to Farid Safarov, Deputy Minister of Energy of Ukraine, the attack affected about 2 million people.

According to CERT-UA, hackers have infiltrated the country’s electricity transmission system to destroy data on computers. Industroyer2 has the ability to send commands to circuit breakers while disabling safety devices called protective relays — automatically cutting off current if they detect hazardous electrical conditions.

Earlier, Microsoft said that it had successfully stopped hacks against Ukrainian targets with Ukraine’s cybersecurity agency, coordinated by Russia’s APT28 group, after taking down seven domains used as infrastructure. attack. Ukraine has been affected by cyber attacks since Russian forces attacked the country on February 24, 2022.

Or like in late February or early March, a large-scale attack on the satellite internet company Viasat caused significant disruption to Ukraine’s military communications, as well as cutting off the internet connection of many businesses. thousand users in Ukraine.

The recent increase in cyber attacks shows that the Russia-Ukraine war is not only limited to a military level, but a mixed war on many different platforms.