Asymmetry in the cyber threat between Russia and Ukraine

In the weeks leading up to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Ukraine was hit by a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack, in which servers were flooded with illegal requests by loading the server infrastructure too high, causing it to stop working. A day before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in particular, important government sites in the capital, Kyiv, were paralyzed, as well as the headquarters of the government, parliament, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other state institutions. Ukraine has blamed Moscow for the cyber attack.

Ukraine has experienced continuous cyber attacks over the past decade, and many of the attacks have been attributed to Russia. In 2020, Ukraine faced about 397,000 attacks and about 280,000 attacks in the first 10 months of 2021 and the attacks were so widespread that the European Union sent a Rapid Electronic Response Team to provide support to Kiev.

Under President Putin, Russia has been credited with carrying out numerous cyberattacks globally. Such attacks can be initiated quickly, independently, or in conjunction with other motor processes. It is also less dependent on time and distance and relatively cheap to implement. Most importantly, it presents an exceptional defense challenge because it comes in a variety of forms. Additionally, due to the interconnectedness of the web, malware can easily be inadvertently transferred to third parties that it was not intended for.

Malware

In January 2022, with diplomatic efforts accelerating, Ukraine experienced a large-scale cyber attack on several government departments. The attack took the form of a message saying, “Ukrainians! … All information about you has become public … “Fear and expect the worst” .. It is your past, your present and your future. The letter included a replica of the flag of Ukraine and a map crossed out with a reference to the "Historic Land".

The cyberattack operations are primarily carried out by the Russian Military Intelligence Service (GRU) and entities not officially affiliated with the Russian state, providing the government with an atmosphere of "reasonable deniability".

One early example of a Russian-led cyberattack took place in December 2015 when Ukrainian industrial control systems networks were targeted with devastating malware that caused power outages in the western Ivano-Frankivsk region; At that time, about 700,000 homes were without electricity for several hours.

Ukraine has been Russia's cyber playground for years. In 2016, suspected Russian malware disrupted Ukraine's power grid and cut power to a fifth of Kyiv in the middle of a frigid winter. Inspired in part by a suspected US-Israeli Stuxnet "worm" that disabled centrifuges for uranium enrichment in Iran. The attack was aimed at protective relays that shut down electrical systems in abnormal conditions. Two years later, Ukraine said it halted a Russian attempt it suspected was disrupting the chlorine plant.

The emergence of this asymmetric type of threat formed new frameworks for managing interactions and policies between states. This field and the wide range of threats do not require high costs, in addition to the difficulty of knowing the source of the threat, not even the possibility of tracking it, and this type of threats remains preferred by states.

Asymmetric cyber attack refers to electronic warfare that causes a relatively large amount of damage compared to the resources used by targeting the victim's most vulnerable security measure. In these types of attacks, the offender has an unfair (or unequal) advantage over the victim and it can be impossible to detect. Often, the aggressor cannot compete in strength or number, making this a popular choice among small intelligence groups.

It has become known that asymmetric threats are one of the most important stability challenges in the twenty-first century, which produced players and actors that are less capable and powerful than states, but they are able to impose the threat, in addition to creating new spaces and mechanisms to impose threats, including cyber threats, which have become one of the main challenges, which imposed Countries have to confront them, so that they have become high priorities in the strategies of major countries, especially in light of the increasing reliance on technology, the Internet and networks in managing military, security and economic affairs, electronic wars and the possibility of launching attacks have become a reality. At the same time, it represents a challenge for states as it falls under the category of asymmetric threats that do not require capabilities or capabilities for implementation.

Asymmetric cyber attacks are becoming more common due to their lower cost, easy availability of equipment, and the potential for significant damage. In order to prevent asymmetric cyber attacks from occurring, businesses, governments, and networks must be aware of their own vulnerabilities and develop strategies that address potential vulnerabilities in those areas. Asymmetric cyberattacks must be treated as a serious threat because the damage can be malicious, lacking in borders, and cannot be specifically monitored.

capacity drain

War asymmetry is not a new phenomenon. Historically it has been observed that on different occasions there has been a marked difference in the relative military strength and strategy of the belligerent nations. However, in the post-9/11 period, the character and nature of war itself has been observed to change particularly amid wars between state and non-state actors. The use of unconventional tools and tactics, be it guerrilla warfare, terrorism, irregular warfare or any other forms, has become synonymous with non-state entities. All of this leads to a state of war where a non-state actor uses asymmetric tactics to target state weaknesses to achieve a disproportionate effect.

It remains to say that “asymmetric war” is based on draining the capabilities of the large state, by luring it into limited and multiple confrontations, with the aim of exhausting it, and robbing it of its focus. It confirms what the researcher Francis Fukuyama once said that the world has changed after the fall of the “Manhattan” towers (in reference to the asymmetric means of war), and he who saw that the main challenge for the world, will be to confront the decay of nation states, through “utopian tendencies”, which bring conflicts and wars And the resulting disasters and calamities.