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Ukraine suspects UNC1151 group due to cyberattack by Belarusian intelligence


Kyiv believes a hacker group with ties to Belarusian intelligence carried out a cyberattack on Ukrainian government websites this week and used malware similar to the malware used. by a group linked to Russian intelligence, a senior Ukrainian security official said.

Serhiy Demedyuk, deputy secretary of the National Defense and Security Council, told Reuters that Ukraine blamed Friday’s attack – which defaced government websites with threatening messages – on a group that was identified called UNC1151 and that it covered up more vandalism behind the scenes.

“We have preliminary confidence that the UNC1151 group may have been involved in this attack,” he said.

His comments offer Kyiv’s first detailed analysis of the suspected perpetrators behind the cyberattack on dozens of websites. Officials on Friday said Russia may be involved but gave no details. Belarus is a close ally of Russia.

The cyberattack has gone viral on websites with warnings to “fear and expect the worst” at a time when Russia has massed troops near Ukraine’s border, and Kyiv and Washington fear Moscow. is planning a new military attack on Ukraine.

Russia has dismissed such concerns as “baseless”.

The office of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Demedyuk’s remarks.

The Russian Foreign Ministry also did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his remarks. They previously denied taking part in cyberattacks, including against Ukraine.

“The humiliation of the sites is just a cover for the more destructive actions going on behind the scenes and the consequences we will feel in the near future,” Demedyuk said in a written comment.

In a reference to UNC1151, he said: “This is a group of cyber espionage affiliated with special agencies of the Republic of Belarus.”

‘Track record’

Demedyuk, who was once head of Ukraine’s cyber police, said the group had a track record of targeting Lithuania, Latvia, Poland and Ukraine and had spread articles critical of its presence. NATO alliance in Europe.

“The malware used to encrypt some government servers is very similar in characteristics to the software used by the ATP-29 group,” he said, referring to a group suspected of being involved. hacking of the Democratic National Committee prior to the 2016 US presidential election.

Demedyuk said: “This group specializes in the field of cyber espionage, with links to Russian special agencies (Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation).

The messages left on Ukrainian websites on Friday were in three languages: Ukrainian, Russian and Polish. They refer to Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, where mass murders were carried out in Nazi-occupied Poland by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). The episode remains a point of contention between Poland and Ukraine.

Demedyuk suggested that the hackers used Google Translation for Polish translation.

“It is clear that they have not succeeded in fooling anyone with this primitive method, but this is still proof that the attackers have ‘played’ the Polish-Ukrainian relationship. just getting stronger every day),” he said.

© Thomson Reuters 2022


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