The scenario of the cyberattack against the KA-SAT satellite network, which occurred on the first day of the Russian invasion, February 24, is beginning to become clear. Tuesday, March 15, during a press conference, the deputy director of the Ukrainian agency responsible for cybersecurity returned to the consequences of the attack.
In the early hours of the day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, several thousand modems for receiving an Internet connection from the KA-SAT satellite thus suddenly stopped working, causing the Ukrainian state “a huge loss of communication at the very beginning of the war”, acknowledged Viktor Zhora, the deputy director of the Ukrainian Cybersecurity Agency.
This is the first time that a Ukrainian official has spoken about the concrete consequences of the cyberattack. These details tend to confirm the link between it and the Russian military maneuvers, but also that the initial objective of the pirates was indeed to disrupt certain satellite links of the Ukrainian State. Several media reported, not long ago, that the latter was a customer of equipment allowing communication using the KA-SAT satellite.
A few days ago, the Reuters news agency revealed that several Western security servicesincluding the French National Information Systems Security Agency (Anssi) and the American NSA, were investigating the cyberattack.
This attack “is part of the Russian methodology”
If Viktor Zhora did not wish to formally appoint a person responsible, this attack against the KA-SAT satellite “is part of the Russian methodology, which consists of attacking the lines of communication”, he explained. Russia tries to disrupt “Satellite communications, Internet service providers, probably mobile operators. Their aim is probably to prevent the Ukrainian military forces from communicating effectively,” the official continued.
More generally, it is the whole “informational sphere” which has been targeted by Russia since the beginning of the conflict, noted Mr. Zhora, citing in particular “the bombing of television towers” or attempts to “replace Ukrainian television and radio channels with their own, in the occupied territories”.
The Deputy Director of the Cybersecurity Authority also noted the absence of large-scale cyberattacks carried out so far, to which the country had been accustomed since 2014. However, he revealed that Ukraine had suffered many smaller offensives. intensity, i.e. more than three thousand denial of service attacks since mid-February, attacks which consist of saturating an online service or a website to make it inaccessible.
Its services also recently discovered a third strain of malicious program intended to destroy data. Mr. Zhora said he lacked the elements to assess its seriousness and hoped that “its effects would not be too significant”. “Russia has been waging a cyberwar against Ukraine for eight years, and it hasn’t stopped with the start of the invasion”he also launched.
The official also confirmed Ukraine’s willingness to legally prosecute Russia for the cyberattacks it launches against Ukraine as part of its invasion: “This is the first hybrid warfare, taking place in both cyberspace and conventional space. All the evidence will be useful to international justice which will prosecute Russian crimes. Including crimes in cyberspace. »