Russian Government Employees Charged in Worldwide Hacking Scheme

Four Russians employed by their government have been charged with attempting, supporting and conducting cyber incursions in two separate conspiracies, the FBI reported Thursday (March 24).

The U.S. Department of Justice alleged the defendants targeted the world’s energy sector from 2012 through 2018. These hacking campaigns were aimed at thousands of computers in hundreds of companies and organizations, in more than 11 dozen countries.

In one of two indictments that were made public, Evgeny Viktorovich Gladkikh, a 36-year-old Russian ministry of defense research institute employee, and his co-conspirators face allegations of damaging another country’s critical infrastructure and causing two emergency shutdowns at the targeted facility. The country and the facility were not named.

The group subsequently attempted to hack the computers of a U.S. company that managed similar critical infrastructure entities in the United States, according to court documents.

In addition, a second indictment was made against Pavel Aleksandrovich Akulov and others who allegedly engineered a two-phase campaign.

The conspiracy was allegedly undertaken by three officers of Russia’s Federal Security Service and their co-conspirators to compromise the computers of hundreds of energy sector-related companies and entities worldwide, the complaint said.

Access to these unnamed networks would have provided the Russian government the ability to disrupt and damage such computer systems at a future date of its choosing, the Justice Department said.

Earlier this week, President Joe Biden warned that Russian cyberattacks on the private sector are coming and advised business leaders to increase their digital defenses.

See also: Biden: Russia Hatching Private Sector Cyber Attacks

Calling cyberattacks part of Russia’s playbook, Biden said that intelligence points to Russian President Vladimir Putin striking the U.S. electronically in retaliation for sanctions imposed in response to the attack on Ukraine.