VIASAT hack impacted French critical services
According to the minutes of a closed-door meeting, Russia's cyberattack in February impacted critical emergency services in France.
Image by Jose HERNANDEZ/Shutterstock
According to the minutes of a closed-door meeting, Russia's cyberattack in February impacted critical emergency services in France.
The meeting, held by Stéphane Bouillon, Secretary General of Defense and National Security for the French Parliament's National Assembly, on July 17, detailed the recent scope of cyberattacks.
According to the French National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (ANSSI,)there were 1,082 proven intrusions last year, signifying a 37% increase from a year earlier.
Bouillon recalled the attack against VIASAT that Russia carried out on February 24, the same day Russian troops poured into Ukraine, sparking a large-scale European war.
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"During the war in Ukraine, we expected many cyberattacks from Russia, but we've seen very few to date. The only notable attack was the one on VIASAT, used by the Ukrainian military to communicate and stretching throughout Western Europe. [...] In our country, it affected ambulance (phone number: 15) and firefighters (18) emergency services," said Bouillon. He did not provide any additional details on the attack.
In May, intelligence from the US, UK, and the EU confirmed that the Kremlin was behind the attack on VIASAT' 's satellite KA-SAT network.
The marks one of the first confirmed instances where a nation-state interferes with commercial satellite services to advance its military goals.
British, American, European, and other allies also claim that the Kremlin was behind the cyberattacks against European wind farms. While the statement does not specify who the victims were, several Germany-based wind farm operators have been hit since Russia started the war in Ukraine.
Wind farm operators Deutsche Windtechnik and Nordex suffered from what is believed to be ransomware attacks. Another wind turbine operator, Enercon, had the company's remote controls knocked out in relation to the attack on VIASAT's network.