Kyivstar aims to restore some of mobile network on Wednesday after cyber attack

VEON

13/12/2023 11:38

Dec 13 (Reuters) - Ukraine's biggest mobile network
operator Kyivstar aims to restore some of its services later on
Wednesday after an "unprecedented" cyber attack, the company's
CEO Oleksandr Komarov said. 
    Tuesday's attack on Kyivstar, which has 24.3 million mobile
subscribers and more than 1.1 million home internet subscribers,
knocked out services, damaged IT infrastructure and air raid
alert systems in some of the regions. It appeared to be the
largest attack since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in
February 2022.  
    "We expected that we would be able to return some services
in the first half of the day today. We see that this will not
happen, but we are moving towards starting to restore some
services in the second half of the day," Komarov said in
televised comments. 
    He added the company faced obstacles that prevented
restoration work from moving faster, and said the level of
attack was unprecedented.  
    In a separate statement on Facebook, Kyivstar, owned by
Amsterdam-listed mobile telecoms operator Veon  VON.AS ,
reiterated that personal client data was safe, and systems
storing it were not damaged.  
    Ukraine's SBU intelligence agency told Reuters it was
investigating the possibility Russian security services were
behind the attack. 
    Moscow had no immediate comment. 
    Russian hacktivist group Killnet on Tuesday claimed
responsibility for the attack via a statement on the Telegram
messaging app, but did not provide evidence.
    On Wednesday, a group called Solntsepyok, which translates
as 'Sun Blaze', also claimed responsibility, posting screenshots
that appeared to show they had access to Kyivstar's servers. 
    Ukraine's SBU also said on Wednesday that one of the Russian
groups claimed responsibility, saying it was a hacking unit of
Russia's military intelligence service GRU. 
    Activist hacking groups routinely make difficult-to-prove
claims about major digital disruptions. Reuters could not
immediately verify the authenticity of the claims.

 (Reporting by Yuliia Dysa, Alexander Marrow and James Pearson;
editing by Barbara Lewis)
 ((Yuliia.Dysa@thomsonreuters.com;))