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Tech world’s Ukraine response mixes evacuation efforts, ad bans, free phones, infosec FUD

As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, the technology industry is trying to use its services to make a difference – and to keep those services available as the war makes it harder to operate.

Nation-state level responses to the invasion have been led by the European Commission, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States, which together on Saturday barred Russian entities from using the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication’s (SWIFT’s) money transfer services. Doing so leaves Russian banks effectively unable to transact across borders using digital technology – but Russia almost certainly still able to use digital technology in the service of its illegal invasion.

The Global Sourcing Association – a UK-based body formerly known as the National Outsourcing Association and which promotes strategic use of services resources around the world – last week reported “evidence of service disruption as companies are struggling to exercise their business continuity plans due to the extent of the disruption and employees are having to decide if they want to stay and work or choose to evacuate the main cities.”

“We understand internet services have been significantly impacted, so even those choosing to stay and work may not be able to,” the Association’s post adds.

That assessment appears accurate. Hitachi’s services arm, GlobalLogic, which employs over 7,000 people in Ukraine, posted its continuity plan including a pledge to organize and fund “temporary relocation of professionals and their families to safer regions.” Subsequent reports suggest that plan was enacted, and an effort to relocate staff to Germany, Poland, and other nearby countries has been invoked.

Apple, which has been urged by Ukraininan deputy prime minister Mykhailo Fedorov to quit Russia, also appears to be ready to assist its people in Ukraine.

But even with all the resources of an Apple or Hitachi to hand, exiting Ukraine is far from easy. Take, for example, the experience of HypaSec CEO Chris Kubecka.

Kubecka has taken to Twitter to detail her journey from Ukraine’s capital city, Kyiv, into Romania. She described a lengthy trip on which fuel was scarce, queues long, and anxiety unavoidable.

Kudecka made it across the border, but experienced delays she attributed to a wiper malware that destroyed Romanian border authorities’ computers and slowed processing.

Social media operators have responded to the conflict in three ways – one of which is trying to ensure their services remain available.

Those services are being assaulted by blizzards of misinformation, censorship from regimes that want news of the invasion kept from their citizens, and disruptions to their networks.

Facebook asserts it has blocked a small-scale disinformation network and shared its asssessment that email compromise crew Ghostwriter has been targeting Ukrainian military personnel.

The Social Network, and Google, have also belateldy cottoned on to the fact that Russian state-controlled media – whose content currently bears even less relation to the truth than usual – make money using their platforms. Over the weekend the web giants therefore prevented such outlets from carrying ads they can use to monetise misinformation.

Carriers are trying to help out by making it free to reach Ukraine – with the caveat that they can’t be sure local infrastructure remains operable. BT’s tweeted offer, shown below, is typical.

Elon Musk has turned on SpaceX’s Starlink space broadband service in Ukraine, and said shipments of the hardware needed to run the service are under way. With transport inside Ukraine limited, it’s hard to know if this is more than an empty gesture.

Information security remains a focus of the conflict, with hacktivist collective Anonymous claiming it has weighed in to disrupt Russia’s government and banks as acts of solidarity with Ukraine.

Numerous other allegations exist regarding different groups attacking or disabling digital infrastructure in Ukraine, Russia, or neighboring states.

Vx-underground claims it has intelligence describing conflict among ransomware gangs as their criminal operators take sides in the conflict.

Some IT pros with connections to the conflict are taking it hard. Veeam senior vice president Anton Gostev has suspended his weekly newsletter for the duration of the conflict.

“Apologies, but I just can’t get my head straight to write anything meaningful … I’m part Ukrainian so you can guess what I feel right now, seeing the bombs hitting cities of my relatives, all the deaths and suffering from a totally meaningless conflict,” he wrote. ®

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