A cyber-attack was launched against a significant Ukrainian internet provider.
Ukrtelecom is working to restore service after it believes it was the victim of an attack. The network was shut down to "safeguard the vital network infrastructure."
Ukrtelecom JSC is Ukraine's monopolist telephone company, also active in Internet service providing and mobile markets.
Yuriy Kurmaz, the CEO of the company stated in a statement: “In order to protect the critical network infrastructure and not interrupt services to the Armed Forces, other military bodies and users of critical infrastructure, we were forced to temporarily restrict internet access to most private users and business customers.”
Netblocks, an international internet monitoring organisation, stated it was the company's biggest outage since the beginning of the Russian invasion last month, with connectivity down to 13% of what it was before President Vladimir Putin announced the war.
They said on Twitter: “Update: Ukraine's national internet provider Ukrtelecom has confirmed a cyberattack on its core infrastructure. Real-time network data show an ongoing and intensifying nation-scale disruption to service, which is the most severe registered since the invasion by Russia.”
According to the BBC, other people in Ukraine using various internet providers had no problems.
In terms of geographical coverage, Ukrtelecom is the largest internet provider, although Kyivstar is the largest in terms of customer numbers.
The United Nations has confirmed 1,179 civilian deaths and 1, 860 civilian injuries since the war began in late February, but the total is believed to be substantially higher. Furthermore, the attack has triggered a humanitarian crisis, with more than 10 million people forced to evacuate their homes, with 3.8 million of them seeking refuge in neighbouring nations.
