"We are conducting test attacks against our systems." Fedorov-about how Ukraine managed to survive the cyber war

The cyber war began approximately six months before Russia's large-scale invasion of Ukraine. Already in October and November, powerful attacks by Russian hackers on critical infrastructure were recorded: they wanted to find out how Ukrainian information systems are built inside, how they are connected to each other, what level of protection they have, and so on.

This was stated by the minister of digital transformation Mikhail Fedorov on September 11 during the annual conference "Yalta European strategy".

Hacker cyber attacks by the FSB of Russia in the fall were supposed to cause maximum damage to Ukrainian infrastructure. However, even then Ukraine was building a security system, says Minister Fedorov.

An important role, among other things, according to him, was played and continues to be played by the work of the team that constantly tests the information systems of Ukraine and attacks them.

"We have created a team that constantly tests our systems 24/7 and attacks them. Thanks to this, by January we were able to find many vulnerabilities in the direction of critical infrastructure and prevent further problems," Fedorov stressed.

The next step in protection is the adoption of a bill on February 16 that allowed data to be stored in the cloud and abroad. Accordingly, when the rocket hit the data center where the data is stored, everything continued to work.

Another area of protection is communication. Here, communication with Elon Musk on cooperation, which was built up before February 24, played into the hands of Ukraine. Therefore, Starlink terminals in Ukraine appeared quickly.

The next direction, which, according to Fedorov, is the future, is the army of drones project.

"We are gradually moving in the direction of the digital economy to Military Tech and the development of drones as one of the key elements of Modern Warfare," the minister said.

And in order for the population to quickly receive new services — within a few days or weeks after implementation — the "Diya"application works.

Such actions, the minister believes, allow Ukraine to survive on the cyber front.