The violent ongoing invasion and attack against Ukraine by Russian forces and dictatorial President Vladimir Putin is beyond absolutely heart-wrenching, as innocent Ukrainians and even Russians who were given no choice or don’t even have a clue what they’re truly fighting for continue to lose their lives to this senseless, devastating war.
But as the late, beloved Fred Rogers of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood once said (as said to him by his dear mother), “Always look for the helpers.” And sometimes, those very helpers can be found in the place you least expect it.
According to new figures that were recently published, at least 300,000 volunteer hackers have joined forces in what has been dubbed the “IT Army” to assist in the ongoing digital fight against Russia.
It’s been clear throughout this ongoing war that Russia has heavily utilized technological and cyber warfare and now one massive group of hacker do-gooders are making damn sure it isn’t easy for them.
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Late last month, Ukraine’s Minister of Digital Transformation, Mykhailo Federov took to Telegram with a link begging anyone with the ability and know-how to join the cyber fight against Russia.
In a tweet, Federov wrote with the link, “We are creating an IT army. We need digital talents. All operational tasks will be given here: https://t.me/itarmyofurraine. There will be tasks for everyone. We continue to fight on the cyber front. The first task is on the channel for cyber specialists.”
We are creating an IT army. We need digital talents. All operational tasks will be given here: https://t.co/Ie4ESfxoSn. There will be tasks for everyone. We continue to fight on the cyber front. The first task is on the channel for cyber specialists.
— Mykhailo Fedorov (@FedorovMykhailo) February 26, 2022
It didn’t take long at all for hundreds of thousands of hackers to volunteer their time and effort to cause “cyber chaos” for Russian forces amid the war, and NetBlocks reports that they have been largely successful in severely disrupting the Russian web services.
Alp Tocker, the Director of NetBlocks revealed, “The crowdsourced attacks have been successful in disrupting Russian government and state-backed media websites.”
Russia has, of course, vehemently denied any involvement in cyberattacks. But global cyberattack tracker Check Point Research (CPR) called their bluff, reporting that in just the first 3 days of the war, online attacks against Ukrainian military and governmental sectors increased by a staggering 196 percent.
One hacker who is a member of the IT Army and spoke on the condition of anonymity told The Guardian, “I wanted to help and use my attacking skills to help Ukraine. I’m from Switzerland, but I’m a strong hacker and I’m so sorry for every Ukrainian. I do it because I stand with Ukraine and I want to help somehow. I think if we hack Russia’s infrastructure they will stop, maybe, because nothing will work anymore.”
The country of Ukraine boasts about 290,000 IT workers and while many of them have put their lives on the line with boots on the ground in the physical fight against Russian forces, so many of them have lent their services to the cyber fight against their invaders.
You can read the full report here.
Featured image via Wikimedia Commons – The Presidential Press and Information Office/B_A licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license/the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication
