November 13, 2024: the United States continues to hunt down and prosecute Russian hackers that were responsible for Cyber War attacks on Ukraine just before the Russians invaded in 2022. Five suspects are members of the Russian military and in Russia. The United States has offered a $60 million reward for those who make possible the arrest of the Russian hackers. This is the largest reward the United States has ever offered. These rewards work and the Americans keep quiet about who received an award and how the U.S. often arranged to have the award winners and their families relocated and sometimes put in a form of the U.S. witness protection program.
The Russian cyber-attacks on Ukraine were known as Whisper Gate and were carried out by the Russian GRU military intelligence organization. The GRU, in one form or another, has been around for 300 years. Espionage and dirty tricks are a long Russian tradition.
The GRU Cyber War offensive on the eve of the Ukraine invasion was directed against NATO supporters of Ukraine, including the United States. This triggered an aggressive and ongoing American response. This appears to have encouraged the GRU to try harder and the Cyber War goes on.
Since 2022 the Ukrainian GRU has been fighting back at the Russian Cyber War efforts and had some success damaging Russian Cyber War assets and stealing Russian government and military data. In July 2024 Ukraine carried out a surprise electronic attack on Russian internet access. This was accomplished by using the largest DDOS distributed denial of service attack ever. The attack disrupted all major Russian internet systems, including financial institutions, government networks and internet-based communications. This included messaging apps and social networks.
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