Cyberattack cripples Ukraine’s biggest telecom operator

There is no indication that the incident has resulted in the compromise of subscribers’ personal data. Two hacker groups, KillNet and Solntsepyok, claimed responsibility for the attack.
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Kyivstar, Ukraine’s biggest telecom operator was hit by a cyberattack that disrupted mobile and internet access across the country. The company has nearly 25 million mobile subscribers and over 1 million home internet users. Kyivstar shared in a Facebook post that ‘specialists and partners have done their best to restore the network from the consequences of the cyberattack,’ and that the data and SMS services would be back online within 24 hours.

Pro-Russia hacktivist group KillNet has claimed responsibility for the attack on Telegram, but did not offer any additional evidence to back its claims.

It is interesting to note that hacking group Solntsepyok has also claimed responsibility for this cyberattack, mentioning on Telegram that they ‘destroyed 10,000 computers, more than 4,000 servers, all cloud storage and backup systems.’ The reason cited for this attack was that Kyivstar was offering services to Ukraine’s Armed Forces and various law enforcement and state bodies.

In a series of posts on X, NetBlocks reported that ‘The cyberattack on Ukraine’s #Kyivstar telecoms operator has impacted all regions of the country with high impact to the capital, metrics show, with knock-on impacts reported to air raid alert network and banking sector as work continues to restore connectivity.’

The company has attributed the attack to ‘a result of’ the war with Russia. However, the company has yet to provide details on the nature of the attack and what caused the outage. In a Facebook update, Kyivstar mentioned that ‘After stabilising the network, all subscribers and corporate clients who as a result of a hacking attack could not use the services of the company, will definitely receive compensation.’

There is no evidence that subscribers’ personal data was compromised in the incident.

Kyievstar noted that all subscribers and corporate clients who could not use the company’s services due to the cyberattack will receive compensation. Kyievstar is now urging its users to be aware of scammers seeking their personal details and stressed that any news related to the compensation and network restoration will be updated exclusively on the company’s official pages.