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US Indicts Russian Intelligence Officials over Cyberattacks Targeting Ukraine

FILE PHOTO: A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration/File Photo
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US Indicts Russian Intelligence Officials over Cyberattacks Targeting Ukraine

FILE PHOTO: A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration/File Photo

The US on Thursday charged five Russian intelligence officials and a Russian civilian with conspiring to launch cyberattacks against Ukraine and its allies in a bid to hobble Ukraine.
In a revised indictment unsealed on Thursday, the Justice Department said a cyber unit of Russia's military intelligence agency conducted "large-scale cyber operations" starting as far back as 2020, before Russia's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
The original indictment, filed in June in the US District Court for the District of Maryland, only named a single defendant: Amin Stigal.
According to Reuters, it accused him of conspiring with Russia's military intelligence agency, known as the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff, or GRU, to launch cyber attacks against computer systems in Ukraine and other countries, including a computer network maintained by an unnamed US agency in Maryland.
Thursday's news comes just one day after the US took several legal actions against Russia to combat alleged efforts to meddle in the 2024 presidential elections, including charging two employees of the Russian state media network RT and sanctioning RT and its top network editor.
It also came on the same day that the Justice Department announced it had secured two indictments against Russian TV contributor Dimitri Simes and his wife over sanctions violations and money laundering.
Earlier on Thursday, intelligence agencies in the US and the United Kingdom warned that a cyber espionage group located within Russia's GRU known as "Unit 29155" was destructively targeting critical national infrastructure.
Unit 29155, which is the group at the heart of Thursday's indictment, is a covert part of the GRU which carries out subversion, sabotage and assassination missions outside Russia, Western officials told Reuters.

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Putin Says Ukraine's Kursk Incursion Has Failed to Slow Donbas Advance

Investigators inspect the site of the Russian missile strike in an office building, amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict, in Kyiv, Ukraine September 2, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Investigators inspect the site of the Russian missile strike in an office building, amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict, in Kyiv, Ukraine September 2, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
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Putin Says Ukraine's Kursk Incursion Has Failed to Slow Donbas Advance

Investigators inspect the site of the Russian missile strike in an office building, amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict, in Kyiv, Ukraine September 2, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Investigators inspect the site of the Russian missile strike in an office building, amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict, in Kyiv, Ukraine September 2, 2024. REUTERS/Thomas Peter

President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Ukraine's incursion into Russia's western Kursk region had failed to slow the Russian advance in Donbas and had weakened Ukraine's own defenses along the frontline helping Moscow's forces.
Putin, speaking at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, said that Russian forces were pushing Ukrainian soldiers out from Kursk where they launched the biggest foreign attack on Russia since World War Two on Aug. 6.
By transferring large numbers of well-trained units into Russia's border region, Ukraine had weakened its own defenses and had allowed Russia to accelerate its advance in eastern Ukraine, he said.
"The enemy's goal was to make us nervous and worry and to transfer troops from one sector to another and stop our offensive in key areas, primarily in the Donbas," Putin said. "Did it work? No."
"By transferring rather large and well-trained units to these border areas with us, the enemy weakened itself in key areas, and our troops accelerated offensive operations."
Putin, who ordered the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, said it was "the sacred duty of the armed forces" to expel the invaders and defend Russia's citizens. He said that the situation had stabilized and that Russia was starting to push out Ukrainian troops from Kursk.
The primary goal of Russia was to take Donbas in its entirety, he added, saying Russian forces were taking chunks of territory in eastern Ukraine more swiftly than ever - and that recruitment rates were increasing in Russia.
"No action is taking place to contain our offensive," Putin said. He said that the Russian advance on the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk was successful.
Though the Kursk attack was an embarrassment for Putin and the top military brass, Russian officials are now casting the attack as one of Kyiv's biggest tactical mistakes of the war because they say it ties down thousands of their troops for little real tactical or strategic gain.
Russian forces, which control 18% of Ukraine, have been advancing in eastern Ukraine since the failure of Kyiv's 2023 counter-offensive to achieve a major breakthrough.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said the attack was an attempt to bring the war to Russia, to force Putin to peace and to carve out a buffer zone to prevent Russian attacks on the neighboring Sumy region.
Ukraine's top commander, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, said that one of the objectives of the Kursk attack was to divert Russian forces from other areas, primarily in eastern Ukraine near Pokrovsk and Kurakhove.