Ukraine: nearly 14 million cyber incidents detected in Q1 2022
Unsurprisingly, the majority of the attacks were tracked as coming from Russia – which also became the top targeted country for ransomware
Nearly 14 million cyber incidents have been detected in Ukraine during the first quarter (Q1)of 2022 alone. Out of these, 78 thousand events were processed as critical, and a total of 40 incidents were registered.
This information was provided in a new report by Ukraine’s Cyber Security Operation Center, which also noted the various types of incidents: vulnerabilities, scam websites, phishing, harmful connection, spyware and sabotage.
Unsurprisingly, the majority of the attacks were tracked as coming from Russia, but a large number was also tracked as originating from the US, China, South Korea and Bangladesh. Dozens of other countries are also listed as the potential source of a smaller attack percentage.
“Shortly before the Russian invasion, ESET telemetry recorded one of two sharp drops in RDP attacks. The decline in these attacks comes after two years of constant growth. But even with this fall, almost 60% of incoming RDP attacks seen in T1 2022 came from Russia,” notes the Q1 2022 cybersecurity report released this week by ESET.
The Slovak cybersecurity company, which got quite personal in the report (“Right across Slovakia’s eastern borders, where ESET has its HQ and several offices, Ukrainians are fighting for their lives and sovereignty in this unprovoked war”), also noticed the surge in phishing, scams and spam.
ESET’s researchers also point to an interesting phenomenon: whereas before the war on Ukraine, ransomware threats tended to avoid targets located in Russia – during Q1 2022, it became the top targeted country. The researchers note that they “even detected lock-screen variants using the Ukrainian national salute “Slava Ukraini” (Glory to Ukraine).”