The SBU repelled more than 9 thousand Russian cyber attacks during 2022-2023. Ilya Vityuk, head of the cybersecurity department of the SBU, said this in an interview with Forbes.
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“ Russia is scaling the number and the quality of attacks increased from 1,400 in 2021 to 4,500 in 2022 and 2023,” Vityuk said. — And I’m only talking about powerful cyber attacks that are recorded and reflected by the SBU.”
The SBU has documents showing that the national system for scaling cyber aggression in the Russian Federation has been operating at least since 2016.
Officers of the active reserve of the GRU and FSB train students in cyber offensive disciplines in military and technical universities, Vityuk said.
After training, officers of the Russian special services select the most talented students who go to work in the GRU and FSB or work on a contract under control. “No other country in the world is such that people are systematically taught to be hackers. Russia started with universities, and over time it will reach schools,” Vityuk said.
Russia’s investments in cyber attacks are measured in billions of rubles. “And that amount continues to grow. They are trying to combine kinetic, psychological and cyber operations,” Vityuk said.