Cyberwar: Ukrainian ICT sector becomes a weapon against Russia

Attacks on Russian websites, donations in cryptocurrencies, notifications with images of the war and information about the number of Russian soldiers who have died in it: Ukrainian technology companies and industry specialists have also become relevant players in the war with Russia.

Reface, a Ukrainian meme creation startup, has sent two million users in Russia texts like “No to war. Go out and protest”, “Open to find out how many soldiers have died”, “We don’t have the money yet but we do have a lot of courage” (famous phrase of Medvedev, the former president of Russia, which he had said in Crimea and had become a famous meme).

MacPaw (CleanMyMac, Setapp, Gemini Photos), a company that develops apps that help optimize the work of Apple computers and has millions of users in Spanish-speaking countries, is actively participating and has its own corporate media where everyone, even Russian users, can “read the truth about the war in Ukraine.”

The company has also provided free access to “CleanMyMac” for journalists covering the war in Ukraine.

“Our job now is to help Ukraine to resist, to make the Russian people as aware as possible so that they realize the horrible truth, and maybe take to the streets to stop Putin,” says Oleksandr Kosovan, the CEO. of the company.

Grammarly, the tenth most valuable startapp in the United States and founded in Ukraine, “has allocated US$ 5 million to organizations and funds that support the people of Ukraine” and has blocked “users located in Russia and Belarus so that they cannot use Grammarly services.

“Cyber ​​attacks prohibited” on Russian websites

“Strictly prohibited from conducting cyber attacks from company or customer computers, network, account or VPN.” This is the subject of an email sent last week by a Ukrainian company in the services sector to which EFE had access.

In the mail sent last week it is explained that this type of action can damage the resources of the company or those of the clients.

The Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine, Mikhailo Fedorov, promoter of “Diia”, a government app for digital services and passports “on mobile”, has organized a digital army that daily informs its subscribers about their next targets, mainly, the sites Russian propaganda website.

A month earlier, hackers believed by cybersecurity specialists in Ukraine to have worked for the Russian government succeeded in destabilizing several Ukrainian government websites.

“Since the war began, many Ukrainian specialists began to attack Russian servers, using denial-of-service attacks, with such enthusiasm that company managers sent a letter asking not to use their servers and facilities,” explains Eugeniy, a man 30 years old, who works in the marketing department of one of the companies in the sector.

Kostia, a 35-year-old software developer, says “it makes perfect sense to ban staging attacks from corporate computers,” but adds that many programmers at the company he works for have personal laptops.

“Nobody can forbid us to do it from personal computers,” adds Kostia, and although he personally prefers to help the Ukrainian army in another way – by paying 1,000 euros in taxes in advance and donating hundreds of euros to the army -, Kostia recognizes that his companions organize themselves in groups to participate in the attacks.

The company for which he works, and whose name Kostia prefers not to reveal, is also collaborating with the Ukrainian government to invite its partners in other countries not to work in the Russian market.

Why the ICT sector is important in Ukraine

According to the 2021 annual report of the Ukrainian ICT Association, in the last 25 years the Ukrainian IT sector has made a qualitative leap.

Starting almost from scratch, it has become an industry that employs almost 300,000 professionals and grows between 25% and 30% annually.

It tops the list of service exporters (more than US$5 billion a year) and generates more than 4% of Ukraine’s GDP. Ukraine is one of the largest exporters of ICT services in Europe.

“Ukrainian professionals are not cheap, but at the same time they are a quality workforce,” says Eugeniy, who believes that Ukraine has a very serious foundation of maths training that gives it an advantage in the market.