The 10th of June, Cyber News

Ukraine  

Measures Are Being Taken to Cybersecurity of Seafarers’ Qualification Documents 

At the beginning of the year, numerous cyber attacks were carried out on the information resources of critical infrastructure facilities. The State Service for Maritime and Inland Water Transport and Shipping of Ukraine (Shipping Administration) in cooperation with the Ministry of Infrastructure has developed a service for downloading electronic copies of qualification documents of seafarers. Next – the obtained copies of documents will be used to create backup databases on the local server, which significantly enhances cybersecurity. To use the service you need to register at the link: https://seaman.marad.gov.ua/register [1].

«100% of Protected Systems do not Exist. Protection Needs to Be Constantly Improved. We Know How to Do It and We Are Ready to Help»

In an interview with the Public Administration Reform portal, Deputy Head of the State Service of Special Communication Viktor Zhora spoke about where and when to apply if you need help building cyber defense: Preventing cyberattacks is easier and cheaper than overcoming the consequences. The state of protection in Ukrainian state institutions is different. Someone approaches this responsibly, has enough experience and expertise. Some people use separate protection tools, but do not approach the issue of protection comprehensively. Someone has no people at all, no money, no understanding of how to defend themselves. Someone lacks the resources to protect. Specialists of the State Special Service have been protecting Ukraine from attacks by Russian hackers for eight years. They know how the enemy works, what to expect from him, what are the weaknesses in the cyber defense of our organizations. The priority today is the protection of Ukraine’s information resources, because every Ukrainian, every institution in the country can potentially become a point of entry for hackers into the most critical information systems. Anyone who needs help can get it [2].

russia  

russia Has Said there Is a Risk of a “Direct Military Confrontation” with the West over Cyber Attacks

Andrei Krutskykh, director of the International Information Security Department at the russian Foreign Ministry, said that Western cyberattacks against russia could turn into a «direct military confrontation». «Cyberattacks affect government agencies, critical and social infrastructure, and repositories of personal data of our citizens and foreigners living in russia. Officials in the United States and Ukraine are responsible for the sabotage. They do not seem to be fully aware of the dangers of aggression and the promotion of banditry in the field of information security», said a Foreign Ministry spokesman. He added that, according to Moscow, cyber attacks against russia are carried out by more than 65,000 “sofa” hackers, as well as 22 organized hacker groups from Ukraine, the United States, Georgia, Poland and other countries. «Do not doubt that russia’s aggressive actions will not go unanswered. You will find out how and where. All our steps will be verified, punctual in accordance with our legislation and international law», Krutsky said. «The West’s militarization of the information space, attempts to turn it into an arena of interstate confrontation, have repeatedly increased the threat of direct military confrontation with unpredictable consequences». He added [3].

World 

Expert: «Ukraine Can Teach the United States Resilience to Cyber Attacks ofrussia»

According to The Register, the cyber attack against the Ukrainian satellite communications provider Viasat, which russia staged an hour before the invasion, was “one of the largest, as we have ever seen.” This is how Dmytro Alperovych, co-founder of CrowdStrike and head of the security-oriented Silverado Policy Accelerator, described it. Analysts have suggested that the cyberattack was aimed at disrupting Ukrainian communications during the invasion by remotely removing modem firmware. This turned off thousands of terrestrial terminals with small antennas in Ukraine and Europe – but did not have the terrible consequences that could be expected. «If the network is destroyed, it is not a big problem, because Ukrainians are ready for it. They have backups, so they can rebuild everything quickly. This is what we have less practice in», Alperovych said [4].

The Hacker Transferred 1 Million Stolen Funds to the Founder of Cryptocurrency Ethereum

According to PeckShield, a cryptocurrency security company, the attacker, who stole 20 million Optimism (OP) tokens, sent 1 million of these funds to the wallet of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. It is unclear why 1 million PRs ($ 874,000) were sent to Buterin. Analysts believe that these were mostly illiquid tokens on decentralized exchanges, so fraudsters simply could not sell them for a large sum. Earlier, the hacker received 20 million OPs due to a mistake by crypto-provider Wintermute. Two weeks ago, the Optimism team transferred Wintermute tokens (this was needed to prepare the OP for the drop), but the latter could not access the tokens because the crypto provider provided the wrong wallet address (the multisig address provided was at the first level of Ethereum, and not on L2). They were overtaken by a hacker in an attempt to deploy the L2 address, and access to the tokens was lost. Wintermute admitted its mistake and promised to redeem the stolen Optimism tokens every time hackers sell them. The company’s reserve funds will be used for this purpose. Meanwhile, the hacker was offered a consultant position and a monetary reward if he agreed to return the stolen tokens [5].