SBU: Russian security services have units working primarily to undermine situation in Ukraine
Russian security services are conducting targeted information work against Ukraine, and some of their units are working exclusively to undermine the situation in our country, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has said.
"In the conditions of a hybrid war, the scale of the information aggression of the Russian Federation, which is organized and coordinated by these structures, increases by an order of magnitude. They are focused on conducting special information operations and actions, including subversive ones. That is, there are separate units that work exclusively 'in Ukraine' and receive funding for this," the SBU press service said, citing head of the SBU Cybersecurity Department Illia Vitiuk at the Ukraine 30 forum on Tuesday.
According to him, TV channels, information portals, social networks, postal services, Telegram channels, so-called troll factories and separate bloggers, which are used for anti-Ukrainian propaganda and destabilization of the situation, are becoming tools in the hybrid war.
The SBU notes that the service's cybersecurity specialists are carrying out comprehensive work to protect the national information space from the encroachments of foreign security services.
According to the SBU press service, in 2020, the Ukrainian security service blocked more than 2,500 communities in social networks with a million audience and more than 20 botnets, neutralized more than 600 cyber incidents and cyberattacks on the information resources of state authorities, and stopped the activities of 20 hacker groups, involved in such attacks.
"Through such networks, they collect intelligence and personal data of Ukrainian citizens, and then attack the bodies and objects of the state's critical infrastructure," Vitiuk said.
The SBU draws attention to the fact that a significant part of such botnets and cyberattacks are coordinated from the Russian Federation. "A similar situation is with pro-Russian propaganda, which is being worked on by professional propagandists commissioned by the security services of the aggressor state. Therefore, the SBU announced suspicions to separate bloggers and administrators of telegram channels, including for high treason and inciting national enmity and hatred," the SBU press service said.