The 23rd of August, Cyber News
Ukraine
Before Independence Day, August 24, the Attacks of russian Hackers Are Likely to Increase
The independence and freedom of Ukraine do not give rest to the russian invaders. The enemy usually becomes more active on important public dates. Therefore, the State Service of Special Communication expects increased attacks by the occupiers on the eve and on the day of the most important national holiday for Ukrainians – Independence Day. And not only on the battlefield, but also in cyberspace. The State Service of Special Communication emphasizes: everyone can be affected by hackers! And in the zone of increased danger – civil servants, military personnel, workers of critical infrastructure, who can become an access point to the information systems of the state. 1
The Ministry of Digital, State Service of Special Communications and the Office of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland Signed a Memorandum of Understanding in the Field of Cyber Protection
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Poland has also been repeatedly attacked by russian hackers. The signing of this document is an important step towards joining forces to repel the enemy in cyberspace.
«The first world cyber war is happening now. Therefore, joining forces and exchanging practices is a logical step in this area. With Poland, we have not only a common physical border, but also common problems in cyberspace, where we are subjected to the same attacks. I am sure that together in this struggle we will become stronger and more effective», – Mykhailo Fedorov, Deputy Prime Minister – Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine. The memorandum will strengthen the joint fight against cybercrime and make the exchange of experience and information about cyber incidents faster and more efficient.
«Cyber defense is not created alone. It is always a joint effort. Too much when we are all under the same threat. If you think you are safe because you have EU cyber regulations in place and you work together in the Union, the threat will come from outside, as it has. We are signing this important Memorandum of Understanding in order to work together with our Ukrainian partners, know more about the dangers we face, learn from each other and become more resistant to cyber threats», said Janusz Cieszynski, State Secretary for Digitalization of the Republic of Poland, Government Cyber Security Commissioner.
Also, Ukraine and Poland will increase their presence in the international arena: participation in international organizations, speeches at cyber conferences, multilateral formats of dialogue and consultations. In addition, the parties will prevent the spread of fakes and disinformation in the information space. «The cyber war unleashed by russia against Ukraine showed the importance of uniting the international community to counter aggression in cyberspace. Joining forces with partners has become one of the pillars of successfully countering enemy cyberattacks. This experience should be disseminated and become the basis for the formation of a collective system of cyber protection of the democratic world. Thanks to the signing of the memorandum, we will be able to share the acquired skills and abilities much more actively with our reliable friends from Poland», stressed the head of the State Service of Special Communication Yuriy Shchygol. 2
russia
The IT Army Congratulates the National Flag Day and Reports on a New Successful Hack
«Happy National Flag Day, Ukraine! We continue the topic of the russian banking system and share the result of another successful transaction. Cyber warriors of the IT-Army gained access to the cloud file storage of Andriy Bloshchetsov, who is the founder and technical director of the russian fintech company Right Line, which serves a number of russian and belarusian banks. In the archives, which in total reach more than 500 GB, you can find source code, documents and many other interesting things. All links are located below in the file». 3
World
Google Has Experienced the Largest Cyberattack in Its History
The other day, Google reported that in June of this year, the search engine faced a large-scale DDoS attack. It was repelled, but the company is worried about the increasing activity of hackers. In June, Google said it blocked the largest-ever HTTPS-based denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, which peaked at 46 million requests per second. In comparison, this is about 76% more than the previous record DDoS attack that Cloudflare prevented earlier in the same month.
As Googlers Emil Keener and Satya Konduru explain, «It’s like getting all the daily queries to Wikipedia (one of the 10 most visited websites in the world) in just 10 seconds». The attack began around 09:45 PT (16:45 GMT) with more than 10,000 requests per second. Two minutes after that, it reached its peak of 46 million requests per second. By then, Cloud Armor’s adaptive protection service had already detected the attack. After that, it went into decline and ended at 10:54 Pacific Time (17:54 GMT). This attack had 5,256 source IP addresses from 132 countries. As before, on June 1 HTTPS requests were used instead of HTTP. HTTPS-based attacks are more expensive because more computing resources are required to establish a secure TLS connection.
About 22% (1,169) of the source IP addresses corresponded to Tor source nodes. However, according to Google security researchers, the volume of requests from them was only 3% of traffic. 4
Indonesia Investigating Alleged Data Breaches at State-Owned Firms
Indonesia is investigating alleged personal data breaches at state-owned telecoms firm PT Telkom Indonesia’s internet service IndiHome and state utility PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN), its communications ministry said on Sunday.
Semuel Abrijani Pangerapan, a senior communications ministry official, said in a statement the ministry had summoned representatives from Telkom and PLN and had sent recommendations on data protection to both firms. A Telkom spokesperson told Reuters on Monday that there was no breach of IndiHome customers’ data.
PLN’s spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment although it was quoted by local media as saying on Saturday that it was investigating an alleged breach. Indonesia has had a slew of alleged data breaches in recent years, including on its COVID-19 screening app which led to President Joko Widodo’s vaccine records being shared widely on social media in September. A data protection bill aiming to bolster the country’s cyber security infrastructure was submitted to parliament in 2020 but has yet to be passed. 5