The Ukrainian government is calling on hackers operating underground in the country to volunteer to cooperate with the state to protect key facilities and fight cyber espionage.
The call was shared on Ukraine’s hacker forum in the morning when Russian troops entered the country’s territory.
“Dear Ukrainian security community! Now is the time for us to join hands to defend the nation’s cyberspace!”, the post read. The content also suggested that hackers and cybersecurity together fill in volunteer information, stating each person’s forte to jointly protect cyberspace.
Yegor Aushev, the co-founder of cyber security company Cyber Unit Technologies in Kiev (Ukrainian capital), told Reuters that he created the post himself at the request of a senior official at the Defense Ministry after this person contacted Contacted him on February 24. His company is working with the Ukrainian government to protect critical network infrastructure.
Another source directly related to the matter also confirmed to Reuters about the call from the Ministry of Defense. A spokesman for the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine has not yet commented on the matter.
According to Aushev, the volunteers will be divided into two groups with separate tasks. The defense team is responsible for keeping infrastructure such as power plants, water supply systems safe, etc. In a 2015 cyber campaign believed to be carried out by Russian hackers, about 225,000 Ukrainians had to live in a power failure.
Meanwhile, the remaining group of volunteers will be tasked with helping the Ukrainian military carry out digital espionage against “colleagues” from the Russian side.
By the end of February 24 (Ukrainian time), Aushev said he had received hundreds of volunteer applications and was preparing to conduct screening to make sure no Russian agents infiltrated.
On February 23, cybersecurity company ESET discovered a new piece of malware circulating in Ukraine, affecting hundreds of computers. All doubts fell on Russia – which has repeatedly received accusations of carrying out hacks targeting Ukraine and many other countries. Victims of these campaigns include government agencies, financial institutions, according to Reuters. Russia denies the allegation.
cyber military. “So our mission was to create this unit this year,” he told the Washington Post.