It’s been over a year since Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, and for those in the tech sector cyber warfare has defined the conflict. Ukrainian organisations, both public and private, have been subject to attacks including wiper malware, spear phishing, and data breaches.
National cyber security agencies, as well as teams of security experts from throughout the field, remain on high alert for heightened Russian cyber activity. Understanding the strategies of these hackers, as well as their individual motivations, has been key to retaining the integrity of targeted systems.
In this episode, Jane and Rory speak to Daniel Thanos, head of Arctic Wolf Labs, to discuss the current state-sponsored threat group landscape, and how the terms of the conflict have shifted over time.
Highlights
“Some groups are more closely affiliated to the government than others. And that could be because quite literally you might have members of the group that it’s their moonlighting job, they literally can be folks that are involved in state cyber operations but by night this is like their freelance gig.”
“I think the outcome that the Russians certainly wanted, happened differently. What I will tell you is if you talk to people that I've been involved in the Ukrainian CERT, the folks that are actually involved in the cyber defence of Ukraine, they have thwarted a lot of attacks. And they continue to do so every day.”
“Their intelligence programmes against NATO aren't going to change, they're only going to intensify. Because now as a result of this war, and as a result of their disastrous policies, they're going to get exactly what they didn't want, which is an expansion of NATO. So NATO now is going to become an even bigger threat to them. And so you can be guaranteed that they're going to only increase their cyber operations against it.”
Read the full transcript here.
Footnotes
- Intellias: Disaster recovery during Russia's war on Ukraine
- Microsoft: Russia increasingly timing cyber attacks with missile strikes in Ukraine
- 'CryWiper' trojan disguises as ransomware, says Kaspersky
- The new wave of cyber security threats facing critical national infrastructure (CNI)
- What is cyber warfare?
- Russian cyber attacks on Ukraine: What we know so far
- Microsoft: Russia increasingly timing cyber attacks with missile strikes in Ukraine
- UK's £6m cyber support package for Ukraine revealed for first time
- Critical infrastructure at risk again from Stuxnet-like attack
- Stuxnet is back, Iran admits
Subscribe
-
RSAC Conference 2025: The front line of cyber innovationITPro Podcast Ransomware, quantum computing, and an unsurprising focus on AI were highlights of this year's event
-
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei thinks we're burying our heads in the sand on AI job lossesNews With AI set to hit entry-level jobs especially, some industry execs say clear warning signs are being ignored
-
RSAC Conference 2025: The front line of cyber innovation
ITPro Podcast Ransomware, quantum computing, and an unsurprising focus on AI were highlights of this year's event
-
LockBit data dump reveals a treasure trove of intel on the notorious hacker groupNews An analysis of May's SQL database dump shows how much LockBit was really making
-
‘I take pleasure in thinking I can rid society of at least some of them’: A cyber vigilante is dumping information on notorious ransomware criminals – and security experts say police will be keeping close tabsNews An anonymous whistleblower has released large amounts of data allegedly linked to the ransomware gangs
-
It's been a bad week for ransomware operatorsNews A host of ransomware strains have been neutralized, servers seized, and key players indicted
-
Everything we know about the Peter Green Chilled cyber attackNews A ransomware attack on the chilled food distributor highlights the supply chain risks within the retail sector
-
Scattered Spider: Who are the alleged hackers behind the M&S cyber attack?News The Scattered Spider group has been highly active in recent years
-
April rundown: MITRE frights and Microsoft launches Recall (again)ITPro Podcast As CISA delivered an eleventh-hour reprieve for the CVE database, AWS reportedly began to pause some data center leases
-
Ransomware attacks are rising — but quiet payouts could mean there's more than actually reported
News Ransomware attacks continue to climb, but they may be even higher than official figures show as companies choose to quietly pay to make such incidents go away.
