Ukraine gathering evidence to prosecute Kyivstar hackers at ICJ

Illia Vitiyuk, the head of the Security Service of Ukraine (Ukrainian: Служба безпеки України, SBU), has announced that the SBU is collecting evidence to build a case to prosecute alleged Russian hackers for attacking Ukraine’s biggest telecom operator Kyivstar, at the International Criminal Court (ICJ) in The Hague.

Vitiuk shared that Ukraine aims to hold both the group members and leaders of Russian intelligence agencies accountable for this attack. He further added, ‘Now what’s more important for us is not just how they initially gained access to the network, but how they managed to navigate it, circumventing substantial security measures at Kyivstar.’.

Vitiyuk shared that they could trace the attack to the hacker group Sandworm, which has alleged links to Russia’s military intelligence service (GRU). The hacker group that claimed the cyberattack, Solntsepek, which claimed responsibility for the attack, has been linked to Sandworm.

The SBU is conducting an impact assessment of the damage caused by the cyberattack. In March, a report by Kyivstar’s parent company, Veon, stated that the cost of the attack was around $24 million. The attack affected millions of telecom subscribers and is touted as ‘one of the highest-impact disruptive cyberattacks on Ukrainian networks’.